BusinessMirror January 14, 2019

HANJIN’S CREDITOR BANKS ‘WORKING TOGETHER,’ GOVT EYES ‘WHITE KNIGHT’

By Rea Cu @ReaCuBM & Samuel P. Medenilla @sam_medenilla

T THIS glorious day—a vessel delivery ceremony at Hanjin’s Subic facility—happened just last January 25, 2018. Yet, it seems ages ago, after the beleaguered Korean shipbuilder filed for corporate rehabilitation last week. PHOTO BY HENRY EMPEÑO

DEPT. OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

PHILIPPINE STATISTICS AUTHORITY

2018 BANTOG DATA MEDIA AWARDS CHAMPION

HE Land Bank of the Philippines (LandBank), as well as the other four creditor banks of Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction Philippines (HHIC-Phil) are working together to address the $412-million debt problem that forced the company to seek relief from the courts on January 8, the Department of Finance (DOF) said.

Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III told reporters that all five creditor banks should focus on working together

to address the financial fallout from the troubles of the giant Korean shipbuilder.

Once known as Subic’s shining star, being the largest investor and employer at the free port, Hanjin filed for corporate rehabilitation.

“LandBank has an exposure to Hanjin, together with other banks. I don’t know the exact exposure of the other banks, but definitely, we are not the largest single lender. It’s a problem, we have to address it.

There are assets to be had, and this is a difficult problem; it has to be worked through by the banks,” said Dominguez,

who is also chairman of LandBank.

It was reported that the five domestic banks with exposure to Hanjin are: The Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC), BDO Unibank, Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI), Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co. (Metrobank), and LandBank.

“It’s going to hurt, but it’s still the early days. The banks have agreed to work together, and see how we can move forward here. The real important thing here is, what are the prospects in their industry, are there good prospects in the industry...,” Dominguez added.

BusinessMirror A broader look at today’s business

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Monday, January 14, 2019 Vol. 14 No. 96

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By Elijah Felice E. Rosales

@alyasjah

HE Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) registered a 41-percent decline in investment approvals for the whole of last year, as firms held on to their capital in anticipation of the rationalization of tax incentives.

Investments registered with the Peza in 2018 slumped 40.97 percent to P140.24 billion, from P237.57 billion in 2017. A total of 529 fresh projects represented these investment pledges, down 4.51 percent, from the 554 projects applied in 2017.

Peza Director General Charito B. Plaza attributed the double-digit decline to the uncertainties brought about by the Tax Reform for Attracting Better and High-Quality Opportunities (Trabaho) bill.

The Trabaho bill will gradually reduce corporate income tax to 20

percent in 2029, from 30 percent.

In exchange, it will restructure the menu of incentives, such as the 5-percent tax on gross income earned (GIE) in lieu of all local and national taxes, granted to firms in economic zones.

Plaza said potential investors held

on to their capital to wait for the final provisions of the measure, while existing locators postponed their expansion plans in fear that their tax perks could be removed soon.

The House of Representatives in September swiftly passed their version of the second tax reform package, dubbing it “Trabaho” bill to highlight a supposed feature of the bill to enhance job opportunities. The Senate, however, opted to deliberate further on the measure amid an uproar over the unintended consequences of its predecessor law, the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN).

“The drop is for new investments caused by the uncertainties of change of policies [and] incentives.

Peza’s existing IT-BPM [information technology and business-process management] industries are expanding and [were at their] highest

“Peza industries are exporters and are efficiency seekers, so they weigh the advantages and disadvantages of countries’ incentives and other factors [for] production given the huge capital investments they will [bring to] the country of their choice.”—Plaza

in the last two quarters when the uncertainties were removed by the Senate’s nonpassage of their version,” Plaza told reporters.

Total investments in the IT-BPM industry in 2018 improved 32.20 percent to P20.56 billion, from P15.55 billion in 2017, but only saw an increase of one project to a total of 188.

See “Peza,” A8

PHL piques interest of Asian investors, data on FDI show

By Bianca Cuaresma @BcuaresmaBM

HINA has overtaken the United States in terms of the volume of net equity capital investments to the Philippines in the January-to-October period last year, according to data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

However, a closer neighbor’s volume of long-term investments to the Philippines is almost triple that of the combined capital placements of China and the US during the period, BSP data indicated.

Figures from the BSP showed that Singapore was the top net equity capital investor to the Philippines during the period, comprising about half—or 45.5 percent—of the net equity capital investments.

Net equity capital investment is the second-largest component of the country’s measure of foreign direct investments (FDI).

Singapore’s net equity capital investment neared the billion-dollar mark to hit $905.65 million. This is 136-percent higher than the country’s $384.25-million investments in the same period last year.

According to the Asean Investment Report 2018, Singapore is the

largest source of intra-Asean FDI, with about $18.3 billion FDI to the region in 2017. The report, however, stated that not all investments from Singapore are “indigenous,” as other multinational enterprises invest in the Asean via their Singapore operations.

Singapore’s net equity capital investments to the Philippines during the period surpassed the $309.54-million combined net equity capital investments of the two rival economic powerhouses, China and the US.

Increasingly Asian

THE net equity capital investments of China—which is currently in a trade spat with the US—to the Philippines rose significantly and reached $189.33 million, from last year’s $13.25 million in the same period last year.

The volume of Chinese net equity capital investments was higher than that of the US, which declined to $120.21 million, from $454.33 million in 2017.

L atest d at a f rom t he BSP showed that, overall, net equity capital investments to the Philippines are becoming increasingly Asian in origin.

PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 52.1710

See “FDI,” A2

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P25.00 nationwide | 5 sections 26 pages | 7 DAYS A WEEK

Peza investment approvals dip 41% as firms await tax perks bill

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Continued on A2

Diokno: Better to use loans for P47-B Mla Bay cleanup

By Bernadette D. Nicolas @BNicolasBM

T

HE budget chief recommended at the last Cabinet meeting that the country obtain a loan from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) or World Bank to finance the “ambitious” rehabilitation of Manila Bay—pegged to cost around P47 billion.

Although there was still no decision on his recommendation, Budget Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno told the BusinessMirror that this proposal was also backed by Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto M. Pernia.

However, Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III was not present during the meeting, Diokno said. “…In fact, I recommended that we just borrow money so that there will be more discipline,” Diokno said. “We will just borrow money from ADB or World Bank.” Sought for clarification, Diokno said this was because the fund needed is “too big.”

“So if it’s not multiyear, it could be five years, because if it’s like that, there will be more discipline to review the feasibility [of the project],” he said, noting that the cleanup was an “ambitious program” covering three regions, particularly the National Capital Region and Regions 3 and 4.

Road tax?

ENVIRONMENT Secretary Roy A. Cimatu checks out the Estero de San Antonio Abad in Manila during an ocular inspection of wastewater outfalls and pipes in the Manila Bay area. NONOY LACZA

Most hotels back Manila Bay cleanup, but...

M

OST hotels around the Manila Bay area have expressed support for the cleanup of the historic bay straddling three of the country’s most progressive regions, but a few want the government to first look at the pollution from informal settlers before the hotels. Others want it to mitigate the impact on tourism numbers once hotels are shut down for alleged pollution.

“If there are violations from hotels, of course these need to be fixed,” said Arthur Lopez, president of the Philippine Hotel Owners Association. But he stressed, “the DOT [Department of Tour-

ism] must plan and must assist in relocating displaced guests with minimal inconvenience to the latter.”

The DENR is implementing a onestrike policy against hotels found discharging untreated wastewater into Manila Bay. About 2,000 hotels are on the Department of Environment and Natural Resources inspection list, as well as 500 condominium developments. (See ,“DENR has 1-strike policy vs pollutive bay condos,” in the B usi ness M irror, January 11, 2019.)

“I just hope those hotels with existing sewerage treatment plants will be exempted from any penalties and sanc-

tions,” said one veteran hotelier managing a large chain of accommodations, but declined to be identified. “We install our STPs right at the planning stage, as it’s part of our corporate social duty responsibility to the environment. Installing them are not knee-jerk reactions. Those are buried in the earth, expensive and as huge as trailer trucks.”

He added, “Hopefully they will commend those compliant, unlike you-knowwhere [i.e., Boracay Island] wherein they applied the shotgun approach and they closed all the establishments‚ compliant as well as violators.

See “Manila Bay,” A2

THIS, as he also confirmed that the government is also looking at sourcing the fund needed for the cleanup from the road user’s tax, billions of which are no longer being released after the President said he wanted the Road Board abolished for corruption.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources has said that the cleanup would take seven years.

Diokno said the Road Board abolition will pave the way for the government to revert the total road user’s tax to the general fund.

“We need to abolish it, then you need to have a special budget. You have to file a bill in Congress for the use of that fund so you need that under the present structure, [since] the road user’s tax is supposed to be used for road maintenance,” he said.

Malacañang has said that the Road Board funds can also be used for Tropical Depression Usman’s victims and public hospitals.

Last Tuesday, President Duterte threatened to close hotels near Manila Bay if they do not practice proper waste treatment. He also ordered Interior Secretary Eduardo M. Año and Environment Secretary Roy A. Cimatu to proceed with plans to clean up Manila Bay, as they did with Boracay.

The President said he is also not bothered if this move will affect the number of tourists staying in these hotels.

n JAPAN 0.0.4810 n UK 66.4972 n HK 6.6557 n CHINA 7.6846 n SINGAPORE 38.5851 n AUSTRALIA 37.4692 n EU 59.9914 n SAUDI ARABIA 13.9082

Source: BSP (11 January 2019 )

News

BusinessMirror

A2 Monday, January 14, 2019

Privacy body to open probe of DFA passport data loss

T

HE National Privacy Commission (NPC) will send out invitations on Monday (January 14) to relevant bodies and officials for the start of a “fact-finding” into the alleged impoundment by a private contractor of the personal data of Filipino passport holders, as revealed by Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro L. Locsin Jr. The chief of the NPC, Commissioner Raymond Liboro, said on Sunday the case involved “many Filipinos, so we exercised our motu proprio powers” to investigate the matter and ensure the rights of citizens under the 2012 Data Privacy Act are respected.

He said two things in this controversy warrant motu proprio action by NPC: it is “large scale in nature” and involves sensitive personal information of citizens, which are protected by law. In a case of breach, the personal information controllers and the contractors could have “serious” liability, according to Liboro.

Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Delfin N. Lorenzana expressed concern over the matter. “If true, then it is a very grave security concern and quite alarming. These are personal information such as full name, date and place of birth and other infor-

mation that could be used illegally,” said Lorenzana on Sunday.

Locsin disclosed in a series of tweets that the database containing the personal information of Filipino passport holders had been carted away by a company to whom passport production was previously outsourced by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA). The company supposedly did this after its contract was not renewed.

He did not name the contractor, but National Security Adviser Hermogenes C. Esperon Jr. identified it as a “French Co.,” adding that its contract had been terminated in 2009.

Locsin said the series of events began during the term of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and got worse during the term of her successor, former President Benigno S. Aquino III. He said it is now the Duterte administration that is

trying to fix the problem as he vowed to look into the mess.

Since it is a national concern, Lorenzana said the Department of National Defense (DND) will work with the DFA in order to minimize the effects of the data loss.

Trust in digital

MEANWHILE, Liboro urged everyone to be “calm,” adding that, “at this point we are not prejudging anyone ...Let’s be circumspect.”

Nonetheless, Liboro said the issue is of critical importance to the future of governance in the country because, “if the government is to transform, it must transform digitally,” and privacy breaches involving government processes could erode public confidence in digital projects.

In a radio interview, Liboro said all parties that had a role in subcontracting the passport production enterprise by the government’s APO Printing to a private subcontractor could be held accountable if it is true the subcontractor “ran away” with the data of Filipino passport holders when its contract was not renewed. It was not clear who exactly ran off with the data—the French contractor in Arroyo’s time, or the subcontractor of APO in the time of President Benigno S. Aquino III. Locsin earlier vowed to punish those behind the passport deal that had inconvenienced many Filipinos, especially those renewing their

passports.

The DFA chief revealed the alleged data loss in the course of explaining to ordinary citizens, especially OFWs, why the DFA was still requiring them to present birth certificates even for mere renewal of passports.

“While you will simply need a copy of your existing passport to renew it, you will need additional documentation if you need a new one.

This means collecting vital records including your birth certificate or other original proof of citizenship document, a photo ID and photocopies of your photo ID,” the web site said on its May 2, 2018, post.

Yasay’s post

FORMER Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfecto Yasay waded in and shed light on the passport mess.

Yasay said that on August 1, 2006, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and the DFA had entered a memorandum of agreement (MOA) covering the procurement and centralized production of machine readable electronic passports in compliance with the standards required by the International Civil Aviation Organization To implement its obligations under the MOA, the BSP awarded, through bidding, the main part of the project to Francois-Charles Oberthur Fiduciare of France through its office in Makati, Yasay revealed. Reports by Recto L. Mercene, Butch Fernandez and Rene Acosta

Hanjin’s creditor banks ‘working together,’ govt eyes ‘white knight’ Continued from A1

As Hanjin propelled the Philippines to the status of fourth-largest shipbuilder in the world, the Department of Labor and Employment had listed shipbuilding among the most promising industries for Filipino workers.

Hanjin, however, had apparently been impacted by the fallout from the woes of international shipping lines, which cashed in on the industry boom in recent years by putting big orders with builders like Hanjin, but under so-called heavy-tail contracts that allowed the shipping firms to make bigger payments toward the end of the production schedule. This forced the builders like Hanjin to borrow big to finance production, according to a special report by the BusinessMirror (See, “A giant stumbles in Subic: Too big to fail?”

BM Broader Look, pages A4-A5, January 10, 2019).

LandBank President and CEO Alex V. Buenaventura also told financial reporters earlier that the Bank’s exposure to Hanjin is around $85 million, expressing hope that the bank can recover its exposure.

“We have an $85-million exposure there.

We’ll have to address the problem. But the good news is that we can recover because the assets of the shipyard are worth $1.2 billion, and the total exposure of the creditors is less than $400 million; down the road we hope to recover our exposure,” Buenaventura said.

“I think the shipping industry is a very important industry, supporting global development...The global economy is improving, the time will come, and I think it’s around the corner, there will be a lot of moving goods through ships,” he added.

Buenaventura said the five creditor banks are moving swiftly to address the problem and a meeting was held on January 10.

FDI. . .

Continued from A1

In particular, the top 5 investor countries to the Philippines in the January-to-October period are all Asian.

During the period, Hong Kong followed Singapore, as its net equity capital investments amounted to $263.97 million. This is followed

by China’s $189.33 million and Japan’s $183.51 million. Taiwan was the fifth-largest country net equity capital investor with $120.92 million.

Co m p a re d t o 2 0 1 7 , h o we ve r, t h e Netherlands was named the top country net equity capital investor to the Philippines with

“The group is coordinated. They are working together...And they agreed to work together until the end.”

On January 9, the BusinessMirror broke the story that Hanjin filed for corporate rehabilitation at the Olongapo Regional Trial Court, seeking protection from its creditors.

The local Hanjin operations had laid off some 7,000 workers last December, and sources said it plans to fire 3,000 more in the coming months, and retain some 300 workers to maintain its factory in Redondo Peninsula, in Subic Bay in Zambales.

Meanwhile, the government was also supporting the efforts of Hanjin to get back on its feet by helping vet potential white knights, which include two Chinese shipbuilders.

Trade Undersecretary Ceferino S. Rodolfo Jr. on Friday said the government is looking for foreign investors that could bail Hanjin out of its financial troubles.

4,000 workers

ONLY 4,000 of its total work force now remain in Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction Co.-Philippines (HHICC-Phil) Inc. as it continues to grapple with its financial crisis.

The DOLE finally confirmed the previous report of the BusinessMirror the shipbuilding firm was forced to retrench two-thirds of its 11,526 workers last month as it reduced its operations from lack of clients.

“Based on January 2019 [termination] report of Hanjin subcontractors to DOLERegion 3, 3,812 workers are undergoing reduction of workdays,” DOLE’s Bureau of Local Employment (BLE) Director Dominique R. Tutay said in a SMS. “These are the remaining workers of the 17 subcontractors of Hanjin,” Tutay said. In the initial years of its operations in the province

$1.54 billion. The US was the second largest at $454.33 million, followed by Singapore’s $384.25 million, Taiwan’s $77.53 million and Hong Kong’s $64.4 million.

The government projects overall FDI to hit $10.4 billion for the entire 2018. In endOctober, total FDI hit $8.5 billion, which means that total investments in the last two months of 2018 should reach $1.9 billion to hit the government’s goal.

Debt instrument—loans extended by foreign companies to their respective subsidiaries in the Philippines—represented the largest component and is not broken down per country. The other component is reinvestment of earnings.

of Zambales since 2006, HHICC-Phil employed about 30,000 workers. The number of its employees gradually declined over the years.

Labor Assistant Secretary Benjo M. Benavidez said HHICC-Phil is now only maintaining a skeletal force as it awaits the outcome of its court appeal to undergo financial rehabilitation.

“The remaining workers are there in case it gets any request or orders as well as to help in the maintenance of the facilities of the massive shipyard,” Benavidez said.

If the rehabilitation is successful, he said, HHICC-Phil might hire additional workers as it resumes normal operations.

Transition process

THE Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) urged the government to provide an interagency intervention to HHICC-Phil to ensure the welfare of its workers.

“It could become a national economic and security disaster issue for the country if we just stand by and do nothing,”TUCP President Raymond Mendoza said in a statement.

Labor Secretary Silvestre H. Bello III earlier ordered the creation of a technical working group to address the needs of the affected workers, particularly the 7,714 displaced employees. Benavidez said their priority is to ensure the retrenched workers get separation pay and other entitlements.

HHICC-Phil managed to pay its liabilities to the said employees, but some, like those of the Asian Ocean Corp. (AOC), a service contractor of Hanjin, asked for higher separation pay.

Employees of AOC sought the intervention of DOLE’s office in Pampanga to resolve the matter on December 12, 2018.

Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino (BMP) Chairman Leody de Guzman said

TRAIN. . .

HHICC-Phil should prioritize paying its liabilities to its workers over its creditors.

“Hanjin’s multimillion-dollar shipbuilding empire was built upon the collective toil and slave-like conditions of its employees. Their workers deserve to be paid in full, immediately and without preconditions,” de Guzman said in a separate statement.

Aside from settlement of benefits, Benavidez said DOLE-Region 3 also started the profiling of the retrenched workers so they could be provided with new employment opportunities. “Many of them can easily find a job since most of them highly skilled. They could be employed in the construction sector or in other shipbuilding companies,” Benavidez said.

Selective intervention

OFFICIALS of the Department of Trade Industry (DTI) and the Board of Investments (BOI) are currently coordinating with HHICCPhil management on possible companies which could take over its operations.

It was reported by trade officials that two Chinese firms have shown interest on HHICC-Phil. However, Nagkaisa, a coalition of 40 labor groups, opposed handing over HHICC-Phil to Chinese companies, citing security concerns.

It said HHICC-Phil should consider getting technical cooperation from the European Union, particularly Aker Group of Norway.

“We have good relations with Norway in the peace process with the NDF [National Democratic Front] and it offers and gives assistance and employment to our seafarers.

We recommend that Labor Secretary Bello initiate talks with the government of Norway,” Nagkaisa Chairman and Federation of Free Workers President Sonny Matula said.

With a report by Elijah Felice E. Rosales

Continued from A8

The government also registered a P102.9-billion loss from the reduction of the PIT lower than its estimate of P108.7 billion; a loss of P3.7 billion from estate taxes from its P1.7 billion target; as well as a P2.3 billion loss from donors tax from its estimate of P1.3 billion for the period.

“Sometimes we make a mistake in estimates, but 94.7 percent, [it’s] not so bad. It could

have been a hundred or over a hundred, it’s not so bad. It’s good,” he added.

The DOF remains confident it will hit its TRAIN annual target collection of P63.3 billion, on the back of the improved collection performance of the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs. It said the full-year impact of the TRAIN will come out in March 2019.

www.businessmirror.com.ph

OSG, IBP collide on double jeopardy issue in Trillanes case

T

HE Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) and the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) have taken contrasting views with regard to the application of the double jeopardy rule in the rebellion case against Sen. Antonio F. Trillanes IV that was recently ordered revived by the Regional Trial Court (RTC) in Makati City.

Solicitor General Jose C. Calida, in a statement, insisted that the reopening of the rebellion case does not violate the senator’s right against double jeopardy.

Double jeopardy is “the constitutional right of an accused in a criminal case against being prosecuted for the same offense for which he has been either previously acquitted or convicted.”

Calida even urged IBP President Abdiel Fajardo to review his criminal law for issuing a statement that the reopening of the rebellion case constitutes double jeopardy.

Fajardo noted that the IBP is standing by its opinion that the dismissal of the rebellion in 2011 owing to the amnesty grant to the senator “has long become final and executory, and they may no longer be revived or reopened without violating the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy.”

“Atty. Fajardo should review his criminal law. He should know there is no double jeopardy in this case,” Calida said.

Calida explained that for double jeopardy to exist in the rebellion case against Trillanes pending

Manila Bay. . .

Continued from A1

The problem is if they will change the parameters again. If so, we’ll need to upgrade our STPs to conform to new parameters.”

The Duterte administration closed Boracay for six months, from April 26 to October 26, 2018, affecting businesses that may have actually been compliant with environmental laws. The DENR also put out a series of confusing memorandum circulars on which establishments should have STPs. Along with this, some resorts had also complained that the DENR also had different sets of easement measurements.

The hotelier said, “for example, we already have an LLDA [Laguna Lake Development Authority] Clearance as well as an ECC [environment compliance certificate]—and both are under the DENR. They’re already strict and comprehensive as it is.”

He emphasized, “Hopefully, they first attend to the major cause of the cesspool that is Manila Bay—the squatters.”

For its part, Conrad Manila said it supports the Philippine government’s campaign to preserve Manila Bay with a long-term plan to rehabilitate it from its current state.

“With our location at the Mall of Asia Complex which is proximate to Manila Bay, we are deeply committed to protecting this valuable body of water, as we always make a difference in the communities where we operate, particularly along environment protection. We share a strong partnership with our local community partners for sustained environment community projects: cleanup drive, proper waste segregation and management, water recycling and energy conservation,” it said in a news statement sent to the BusinessMirror.

An official of another hotel, who requested anonymity as the official was not authorized to speak on the matter, said: “As for President Duterte’s directive, I think it’s a good move, to help cleanup Manila Bay. Many hotels like us are championing sustainability and it’d be a shame if they didn’t have proper water treatment facilities to begin with. Our facilities are reviewed by a third party monthly, and samples are submitted to the DENR in compliance with the law. We also do our bit in coastal cleanups, having worked with government agencies, Philippine Coast Guard, among others.”

The hotel official added that the establishment’s “wastewater is tested monthly by a third party, submitted to the DENR, and we’re compliant with the standards.”

According to a presentation by the DENR of its action plan to clean up Manila Bay during a Cabinet meeting last January 7, the Manila Bay area spans 1,994 square kilometers with a coastline of 190 km, comprising three regions—the National

before Branch 150 of the Makati RTC, three elements must be present: (1) a first jeopardy must have attached prior to the second; (2) the first jeopardy must have been validly terminated; and (3) the second jeopardy must be for the same offense as that in the first.

He said the legal jeopardy rule applies only “upon a valid indictment before a competent court, after the accused has been arraigned, the accused having entered a valid plea, and the case was dismissed or terminated without the express consent of the accused.”

“In the case of Trillanes, the last element for legal jeopardy to attach is obviously lacking. The rebellion case was dismissed by the RTC Makati Branch 150 in 2011 because Trillanes himself filed a motion to dismiss. Obviously, by filing the motion, he categorically demonstrated that the dismissal of the case against him was with his express consent,” Calida said.

“No legal jeopardy attached to the first dismissal of the case against him. Hence, the reopening of the case is proper.”

He further argued that the dismissal of the rebellion case was predicated on an amnesty granted to Trillanes.

“Since the amnesty was later declared void by Proclamation 572, it has no legal effect. It cannot prevent the RTC Makati Branch 150 from proceeding with the case,” the Solicitor General added. Joel R. San Juan Capital Region, Central Luzon and Calabarzon.

Sixteen river systems drain into the bay including the Angat River, Pasig River, Marikina River and the Rio Grande.

Cimatu’s warning

ON Friday, Secretary Roy A. Cimatu inspected the bay area and said the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) will not hesitate to close any establishment found polluting the bay.

Prior to the scheduled commencement of the planned rehabilitation of the natural harbor on January 27, the DENR chief led the inspection of Estero de San Antonio de Abad, a waterway that directly drains into the Manila Bay through an outfall at the Manila Yacht Club.

Together with other officials of the DENR and partner agencies, he witnessed effluents coming from the pipes of some of the nearby establishments that actually flow into the estuary.

“We have to correct it,” Cimatu told reporters, while expressing disappointment at the sight of untreated discharges that validated reports on the disposal of their wastewater to the Manila Bay. Estero de San Antonio de Abad, according to him, will be the “ground zero” for the Manila Bay rehabilitation.

The DENR found out that its fecal coliform level is at around 1.3 billion most probable number (MPN) for every 100 milliliters (ml).

Having the highest range of this group of harmful bacteria from human and animal feces, this 1.2-kilometer (km) polluted estuary is referred to as one of the “Billionaire’s Lanes,” or priority areas for the rehabilitation plan, in reference to the billions in bacteria.

The coliform level of the nearly 2,000 squarekm Manila Bay, on the other hand, is at 330 million MPN/100 ml, or 3.3 million times above the standard safe level of 100 MPN/100 ml fit for swimming.

The DENR said it aims to lessen the coliform level to less than 270 MPN by December of this year. “We will be going upstream,” Cimatu bared of their next moves, following their inspection of some of the suspected erring establishments located at the mouth of the popular sunset viewing spot of the country’s capital.

He specifically pointed out to big establishments that contribute to water degradation at the portion of Estero de San Antonio de Abad along Leveriza Street, which has about 200 million MPN/100 ml coliform level.

There are about 304 commercial establishments and 38 hotels to be visited by the DENR and partner agencies as part of the rehab activities.

“We will check if they are connected to the sewer line or have a [sewage] treatment plant [or STP],” said the environment secretary. “Even the Maynilad and the Manila Water will also be subjected to our inspection.” Reports by Ma. Stella F. Arnaldo and Roderick L. Abad

Economy BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug • Monday, January 14, 2019 A3

CTRM decides to retain 5% tariff on MDM

By Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas @jearcalas

& Cai U. Ordinario @caiordinario

T

HE Cabinet-level Committee on Tariff and Related Matters (CTRM) has decided to retain the 5-percent tariff on mechanically deboned meat (MDM) of chicken despite the opposition of local poultry stakeholders and the Department of Agriculture (DA).

Agriculture Undersecretary Segfredo R. Serrano confirmed the decision of the CTRM to the BusinessMirror almost a month after the committee convened in December.

“They made the decision over my vehement objection,” Serrano said in an interview. Serrano represented Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol in the CTRM meeting held last month.

Serrano said only the DA opposed the retention of the 5-percent tariff while the economic managers and

even the Department of Trade and Industry pushed for it.

The CTRM is chaired by the Trade and Industry Secretary and co-chaired by the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) Director General.

Its members include the Executive Secretary, the Secretaries of Agriculture, Budget and Management, Labor and Employment, Agrarian Reform, Finance, Foreign Affairs and Environment and Natural Resources.

The Central Bank governor and the chairman of the Tariff Commission are also part of the CTRM. The CTRM’s decision is only recommendatory and would be submitted to the Neda Board, according to Serrano. The CTRM is one of the inter-agency committees under the Neda Board and is tasked to advise the President on tariff and other related matters and the effect on the Philippines of various international developments.

Serrano said the DA would still

write a memorandum to President Duterte to express the position of the agency and agriculture stakeholders on the matter.

‘Not inflationary’

SERRANO disclosed that the Tariff Commission found that reverting tariffs on MDM imports to its 2012 level of 40 percent would not have a “substantial” economic impact. The government slashed the tariff on MDM to 5 percent as a concession to the country’s trade partners for allowing Manila to extend its special treatment for rice.

The DA official added that the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has already factored in the 40-percent tariff on MDM in its inflation forecast. Citing the BSP’s study, he said the government would still achieve its inflation targets even if the tariff level on MDM imports would go back to its 2012 level.

“Why would agriculture have to pay just so they could get few

more basis points [off] the inflation rate? There is no substantial reason to maintain [the 5 percent tariff],” he added.

Serrano said maintaining the 5-percent tariff on MDM imports would prolong the prejudice to the poultry subsector.

“It was a concession made at a cost to a sector so that [injured] sector should get relief,” he said. “The protection should be reinstated. Now they want to continue the prejudice against the sector.”

United Broiler Raisers Association President Elias Jose Inciong expressed disappointment over the CTRM’s decision and pointed out that lower tariffs on MDM would mean continued technical smuggling of meat products.

“That is very unfortunate. It is consistent with the government policy since 1995 to favor importers ostensibly to benefit consumers,” Inciong told the BusinessMirror.

“The sad fact is that imports have

only fattened the pockets of traders with no benefit to the consumers. It also undermined local industries.”

Serrano also said that if the government decides to keep the 5-percent tariff on MDM imports, it could set a precedent for other trade-partners to seek for the retention of concessionary rates on other commodities covered by Executive Order 23.

‘Not fatal’

HOWEVER, Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) Senior Research Fellow Roehlano M. Briones said the CTRM decision “will not be fatal” to the local poultry and livestock subsector.

Briones added that lower tariffs for MDM means cheaper products for consumers of food items, such as hotdogs. These consumers are usually low-income households. “[This has been in effect since] 2015, but the growth of the hog and fresh meat sector did not contract.

So any prediction of catastrophe

is completely unfounded,” Briones told the BusinessMirror in a phone interview.

“Buyers of hotdogs [and users] of MDM get to enjoy lower cost of processed meat products. So on the balance, I think [lower MDM tariffs] is good for the economy,” he added.

Former Tariff Commissioner George Manzano said the primary purpose of imposing higher tariffs is to protect the local sector and allow them to become more competitive.

Manzano said, however, that if a protection is given and the local sector do not take the opportunity to modernize their processes, invest in their production facilities and increase their production, consumers will also be at the losing end.

Currently, he said the Philippines does not have a comparative advantage in meat production. This is usually the domain of countries like the United States and those in Europe.

DENR, 12 agencies to craft Manila Bay rehab plan ‘Govt efforts to curb

By Jonathan L. Mayuga @jonlmayuga

A

N interagency body led by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) will kick off exploratory talks this week to come up with a plan on how to rehabilitate Manila Bay. Environment Undersecretary Benny D. Antiporda, the deputy spokesman of Secretary Roy A. Cimatu said the DENR chief has been tasked by President Duterte to lead the rehabilitation of Manila Bay. “There will be an interagency meeting composed of representatives from the mandamus agencies.

Probably more will eventually invite to join [the interagency body],” Antiporda said.

To recall, on December 18, 2008, the Supreme Court ordered 13 government agencies to “clean up, rehabilitate, and preserve Manila Bay, and restore and maintain its waters to SB level to make them fit for swimming, skin diving and other forms of contact recreation.”

Under DENR Administrative Order 34, Class SB refers to areas regularly used by the public for bathing, swimming and skin diving.

Aside from the DENR, the other concerned agencies are the Departments of Agriculture, Public Works and Highways, Interior and Local Government, Education, Health, and Budget and Management, the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System, Local Water Utilities Administration, Metropolitan Manila Development Authority, Philippine

A MAN collects recyclable materials from the pile of garbage that was washed ashore on Manila Bay by strong waves brought by Tropical Depression Henry on July 16, 2018.

Thirteen agencies will start discussion on a plan to rehabilitate Manila Bay, according to the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. FILE PHOTO

Coast Guard, Philippine National Police-Maritime Group and Philippine Ports Authority. These agencies are collectively referred to as “mandamus agencies.”

Antiporda, the DENR’s undersecretary for solid waste management and local government units, was earlier quoted in news reports as saying that the Manila Bay rehabilitation will take seven years to complete and a budget of not less than P47 billion.

“By next week, the secretary will publicly announce some of the plans,” he said.

Last week Cimatu declared that the strict implementation of Republic Act 9275, or the Philippine Clean Water Act of 2004, is the “key

to addressing water quality issues and other environmental problems in the historic Manila Bay.” Cimatu recently conducted an ocular inspection of the Estero de San Antonio de Abad in Malate, Manila, where outfalls from establishments in the area discharge their wastewater.

After the inspection, Cimatu ordered that establishments have to put up their own sewage treatment plants (STPs), prohibiting the direct discharge of wastewater in the esteros.

T he DENR chief a lso gave concerned business establishments three months to put up their own STPs.

To jump-start the rehabilitation, the DENR will start the cleanup of esteros by tracing the sources of untreated wastewater.

The planned rehabilitation program will be strategic to oversee the implementation of the threephase Manila Bay Action Plan.

Phase 1 involves the cleanup and improvement of water quality improvement, Phase 2 involves actual rehabilitation and Phase 3 covers protection and sustainment.

Phase 1 is set to begin this year.

It will include the cleanup of esteros and waterways, reduction of the level of fecal coliform and toxic discharges from establishments, and provision of temporary sanitation facilities for informal settlers residing along the esteros and the Manila Bay shoreline.

Solid waste management and planning for the relocation of the informal settlers will also be done.

Critics of the Duterte administration remain unimpressed by the DENR chief’s plan.

In a statement, the Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang Mamamalakaya ng Pilipinas (Pamalakaya) said the DENR itself is the one facilitating the destruction of Manila Bay. This, after one of Pamalakaya’s local chapters received a notice of scoping from the DENR to reclaim a total of 420 hectares of Manila Bay within the municipal waters of Bacoor, Cavite.

The public scoping is an early stage of environmental impact assessment where the proponent aims to provide an overview of the proposed project.

inflation will bring relief to more Pinoys’

By Bernadette D. Nicolas @BNicolasBM

M

ALACAÑANG said over the weekend that efforts of the government to tame inflation will allow more Filipino families to get a respite from high prices even as the country’s poverty rate remains high.

Presidential Spokesman and Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador S. Panelo also welcomed as a “positive development” the Fourth Quarter 2018 Social Weather Stations Survey results on Self-Rated Poverty. Survey results showed a slight drop in the number of Filipino families considering themselves as poor.

From September 2018’s 52 percent, or about 12.2 million families, the latest survey results indicated that this declined to 50 percent, or about 11.6 million Filipino families who rated themselves as poor in the last quarter of the year.

“Such improvements may be perceived to be in consonance with the December 2018 drop of inflation, registering at 5.1 percent— the lowest since June 2018,” Panelo said in a statement on Sunday.

“With the President’s tireless efforts in addressing and taming the inflationary effects of the pric-

PHL to push for ‘inclusive globalization’ at WEF annual meet

M

ANILA will carry the agenda of inclusive globalization at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in a bid to open up more trade opportunities for small businesses.

Trade Secretary Ramon M. Lopez said the Philippine agenda at the WEF

Annual Meeting 2019 will center on inclusive globalization in the face of trade conflicts between economic superpowers. He specified, for one, the need to generate more cooperation to accelerate trade and investments.

The country will also call for the

opening of special market access and technical cooperation for developing economies, as well as the upgrading of industries to adapt to the Fourth Industrial Revolution, Lopez added.

Further, the Philippines will stress at the WEF platform the need to digi-

talize and improve the capabilities of micro, small and medium enterprises.

This is in line with the policy thrust of President Duterte to fund and assist MSMEs, which comprise 99 percent of business establishments.

“The WEF will be an opportunity

to interact with world trade ministers and call for free and fair globalization, as well as advocate for the use of technologies in trade,” Lopez said in a statement.

As the country’s official representative to the WEF, Lopez is penciled to

es of basic goods and commodities, we remain optimistic that many Filipino families would continue to feel more comfort this year,” he added.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas has advanced the forecast that inflation for 2019 is expected to decelerate below 4 percent.

A lthough there is a dip in the self-rated poverty results, Malacañang said the government is leaving no stone unturned to sustain high economic growth, create more jobs and ease consumer prices.

“Even as we acknowledge such positive development, we note however that the poverty among Filipinos is still high,” Panelo said.

“Our economic managers are vigorously pursuing policies and programs geared toward reducing the poverty level and propelling the country’s economic development,” he added.

The same survey also found 34 percent, or an estimated 7.9 million families, rating themselves as “food-poor.” This is two points below September 2018’s 36 percent or an estimated 8.5 million families.

T he sur vey was conducted from December 16-19, 2018 using face-to-face interviews of 1,440 adults nationwide.

participate in a World Trade Organization meeting on trade reforms and hold bilateral discussions with several trade ministers. The trade chief will also lead an investment forum, as well as roundtables with multinationals and foreign business chambers. Elijah Felice E. Rosales

The Nation

A4 Monday, January 14, 2019 • Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug

BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Drilon warns Senate bicam on Road Board could create legal dilemma

S

By Butch Fernandez

@butchfBM

EN. Franklin M. Drilon on Sunday cautioned the Senate leadership against the bid of House Majority Leader Rolando G. Andaya Jr. to convene a bicameral conference committee on the abolition of the Road Board. Drilon also warned that any breakdown in bicam talks could lead to a problematic situation, such as the Board continuing to exist beyond the 17th Congress.

Drilon insists that the measure abolishing the controversial body “has been validly passed.”

“With all due respect [to Majority Leader Juan Miguel F. Zubiri who backed Andaya’s bicam bid], I disagree with that. Senate President [Vicente] Sotto III and I had the same position.

We both accepted the [original] House version abolishing the Board,” Drilon said. “To have a bicam means the Senate will reconsider that version.”

If for any reason the bicameral panel talks break down, there is the possibility that the Road Board, which has been dispensing billions—outside of the budget and, therefore, beyond congressional scrutiny—from the collection of the Road User’s tax, will continue to exist, Drilon pointed out in a radio interview.

The Minority Leader recalled that the Board had sole leeway in disposing of the road user’s tax for years, giving

rise to allegations of corruption, “and that is why the Senate is determined to abolish this.” However, he added in a mix of English and Filipino, that “the House rejected the Senate bill for that, so we accepted their version” for the abolition.

“Yet now, our majority leader [Zubiri] says we should convene the bicam.

With all due respect, we disagree. Very simple, when the bicam convenes, that means the Senate is reconsidering our earlier decision to accept the House version. But wasn’t it our and Senate President Sotto’s decision to accept the House version, precisely to do away with convening the bicam so the President can immediately sign it into law?”

Drilon continued: “If we go into bicam at this point, and we don’t agree in the bicam, well, in a few months’ time the 17th Congress will end, and that means the Road Board will continue to exist. That’s why it is important that

we maintain our position that the bill has been validly passed.”

At this point the one thing needed is to have an enrolled copy, which he surmised Speaker Gloria MacapagalArroyo would not sign even though Sotto will sign it for the Senate.

Even if the Senate President or Speaker don’t sign the printed copy, it does not mean that the abolition cannot be a law, as “neither the Speaker nor Senate President have veto powers,” Drilon explained.

The two leaders of Congress “only certify that the right process of lawmaking was followed,” said Drilon, a former Justice secretary.

“I repeat, the signatures of the Senate President and Speaker merely certify the process was followed. In this case, the records will show it was followed.

So, even if the Speaker, does not sign it, there’s no reason why it cannot become a law once the President approves it.

Right now, Drilon notes that no releases have been made from the MVUC, or Motor Vehicle Users Charge Fund, but during budget hearings he will raise the issue of reported “large releases” made in 2017.

Under the law, the MVUC should only be used for road-related projects like road maintenance, signages and street lights.

“Unfortunately,” Drilon said, “using the funds for typhoon-related areas is not allowed by the law.”

This is why it is important to abolish the board now, so the outstanding funds can be integrated into the 2019 budget, from where parts of it can be allocated for typhoon-hit areas, he added, opening the door to a possibility of a supplemental budget for the purpose.

UNITY WALK

Unidentified members of organizations hold a banner during the “Unity Walk, Interfaith Prayer Rally and Peace Covenant Signing for the 2019 Midterm Elections” held at the Quezon City Memorial Circle on January 13, which poll officials said is day one of campaigning. NONOY LACZA

Senate to scrutinize insertions in budget

S

ENATE Minor it y L eader Franklin M. Drilon vowed over the weekend to scrutinize the reported multibillion-peso “insertions” in the Lower House’s version of the P3.7-trillion 2019 budget bill submitted by Malacañang for Congress approval.

The very first step we’ll take is to ask how senators’ view the insertions at the House of Representatives, from the “agency submission up to” the submission of the President’s budget, Drilon said in Filipino.

He added: “May mga alegasyon na may mga idinagdag na pondo na hindi alam ng ibang departamento.” [There were allegations some funds were added the respective department is unaware of.]

Drilon disclosed reports reaching his office that the “huge House inser-

tions” amounting to more than P20 billion were tucked in the budgets of at least two spending agencies: the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG).

It’s not only in the DPWH; there’s also more than P20 billion inserted in the allocation for the DILG, which they are not aware of, Drilon said in Filipino.

“Iyan po ang aming susuriin [That’s what we’re going to scrutinize].”

At the same time, the Senate Minority leader expects the senators would also scrutinize the reported P75-billion funding for local infrastructure projects in the Bicol province bailiwicks of local officials reported to be related to Budget Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno. ”That is the allegation of [Rep. Ro-

lando] Andaya; most likely it cannot be avoided that this will be brought up in the Senate debates on the budget bill,” Drilon added.

The Senate minority leader, however, declined to speculate when asked whether Diokno’s alleged “insertions” could derail early approval of the annual money measure: “We do not know. It’s too speculative at this point. Pakinggan at tingnan natin kung ano ang mangyayari [Let’s wait and see what would happen].”

Still, Drilon indicated that the budget bill can be passed before the month ends.

“Ngunit sa akin po, tatapusin natin ang budget not later than end-January,” he said noting that deliberation of the budget of the DPWH and three other departments—health, national defense and tourism—remained. Butch Fernandez

House committee to continue investigation of Diokno, Aremar

By Jovee Marie N. Dela Cruz @joveemarie

T

HE House Committee on Rules will continue its probe on questionable P75-billion insertions in the 2019 national budget on Tuesday with a call from the minority leader to compel Budget Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno to attend the hearing.

The committee has formally invited Diokno, his daughter Charlotte Justine, and his in-laws who are incorporators of Aremar Construction Co. to appear as resource persons in the panel’s next hearing scheduled on January 15.

The committee, at the same time, sent subpoenas to senior officials of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), Anti-Money Laundering Council, Bureau of Internal Revenue and Department of Budget and Management (DBM), as well as the individual who acted as the liaison officer of CT Leoncio Construction in dealing with government contracts.

House Minority Leader Danilo E. Suarez of Quezon said the panel chaired by House Majority Leader Rolando Andaya Jr. would subpoena Diokno if the DBM chief fails to attend the investigation.

“We must [compel Diokno to attend the hearing].”

Meanwhile, Andaya said the lower chamber expects full cooperation and full disclosure from those invited to the hearing as they will be testifying under oath.

“We also expect to be provided with documentary evidence that

could shed light on the anomalous budget practices of the DBM and questionable allocations for DPWH, which we uncovered during the previous hearing,” he said.

“This is the proper forum for our senior government officials to air their side on the issues at hand. We will give them all the time needed to present their case. But we expect specific responses to specific issues.

No general denials, and hiding behind technicalities.”

According to Andaya, facts that will be threshed out in the next hearing include multibillion-peso floodcontrol projects, which did not pass through the legal process for selection, that were inserted into the national budget without the knowledge of DPWH Secretary Mark A. Villar.

“A huge chunk of the floodcontrol projects was allocated not to flood-prone areas and danger zones, but to favored areas such as Casiguran, which has no threat of flooding,” he said.

Andaya said Aremar Construction, which is owned by the in-laws of Diokno, cornered billions of pesos worth of projects in Sorsogon using dummy companies.

Andaya resign?

CAMARINES Sur Rep. Luis Raymund Villafuerte said now that Andaya himself has admitted disdain for his supposedly “thankless job” as House majority leader, the “most honorable thing” for him to do is to quit his post as soon as Congress resumes session on January 14.

“Andaya—if he has any sense of delicadeza left in him—owes it to

himself, his peers in the House of Representatives and to the Filipino people in general to resign right away as House majority leader, given that he has surprisingly issued a statement scoffing at his premier post as a ‘burden’ and act of ‘forced labor’ that he had supposedly wanted to be relieved off last year yet,” Villafuerte said.

Villafuerte earlier called on the House majority coalition to sack Andaya as majority leader for “subverting” Malacañang “with his nonstop maneuvers to derail the congressional approval of President Duterte’s already-delayed 2019 national budget plan.

“My fellow Bicolano legislator should not wait for his irate peers to do it for him,” he said. “He should be honorable enough to do it on his own by voluntarily quitting his post, moreso because he himself claimed that he had reluctantly accepted the job on condition that he would keep it for only six months.”

A vice chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations, Villafuerte said that “although it was Andaya’s right as a legislator to continue investigating alleged [DBM] fund irregularities—which seemingly exist only in his warped mind—he should not unduly drag the pro-Duterte majority coalition into [a] ‘crusade’ as ringleader of the wrecking crew against the department and Malacañang by staying one minute longer as the House official supposed to be in charge of shepherding the passage of the President’s priority legislation in the bigger chamber.”

The World BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Editor: Angel R. Calso • Monday, January 14, 2019 A5

Two big producers just called a bottom for oil: $60 a barrel

I

TALY’S top oil producer and Oman’s energy minister predict the latest oil rebound will stick.

Prices are up more than 20 percent since hitting an almost twoyear low last December, enough to alter Opec+ rhetoric from reassuring investors that it will cut output to taking credit for the rebound, and in the case of Oman, forecasting where oil will trade for the year.

Oman Oil Minister Mohammed Al-Rumhi told Bloomberg TV that the agreement between the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) and

partners including Russia and Oman can sustain prices at $60 a barrel. He sees crude trading between that bottom and $70 a barrel this year. Claudio Descalzi, the chief executive officer of Italy’s Eni SpA, told Bloomberg TV the range will be between $60 and $62 a barrel.

“I see demand for hydrocarbons still growing,” Descalzi said. “When we talk about 1.3 to 1.4 million barrels a day, that is still there,” referring to potential demand increases.

A few weeks ago, as global benchmark Brent crude briefly dipped below $50 a barrel, Opec ministers were taking turns to remind investors that they would trim supply. That message, along with brightening prospects for US-China trade talks seem to have worked, pushing the gauge above $60 a barrel and ending talks about an extraordinary Opec meeting.

No extra meeting

“WE only do that during emergencies, and there is no emergency,” UAE Energy Minister Suhail Al Mazrouei said in an interview on Sunday, referring to a proposed meeting he floated last December.

The oil glut will be cleared in the

Trump tweets into the void as govt shutdown sets record

SPEAKER of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., talks to reporters after signing a House-passed bill requiring that all government workers receive retroactive pay after the partial shutdown ends, at the Capitol in Washington on Friday, January 11, 2019. She is joined by (from left) Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, D-D.C., Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., Rep. Anthony Brown, D-Md., and Rep. Don Beyer D-Va. AP PHOTO/J. SCOTT APPLEWHITE

W

ASHINGTON—As the partial government shutdown slipped into the record books on Saturday, members of Congress had left town, no negotiations were scheduled and President Donald J. Trump tweeted into the void.

He did not tip his hand on whether he will move ahead with an emergency declaration that could break the impasse, free up money for his wall without congressional approval and kick off legal challenges and a political storm over the use of that extraordinary step. A day earlier, he said he was not ready to do it “right now.”

Lawmakers are due back in Washington from their states and congressional districts in the new week.

Trump fired off a series of tweets pushing back against the notion that he doesn’t have a strategy to end what became the longest government shutdown in US history when it entered its 22nd day on Saturday. “Elections have consequences!” he declared, meaning the 2016 election in which “I promised safety and security” and, as part of that, a border wall.

But there was another election, in November, and the consequence of that is that Democrats now control the House and they refuse to give Trump money for a wall.

Trump threatened anew that the shutdown could continue indefinitely. Later on Saturday, he supplemented a day’s worth of tweets by telephoning in to Fox News Channel’s Justice with Judge Jeanine Pirro from the White House to continue his public relations blitz for the wall. Pirro pressed Trump on why he had yet to declare a national emergency. He said he’s giving Congress a chance to “act responsibly.”

Trump also said he has “no idea” whether he can get a deal with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who opposes spending money on an “ineffective, wasteful wall.”

The president is expected in the new week to sign legislation passed by Congress to provide back pay for some 800,000 federal workers who aren’t being paid during the shutdown. Paychecks were due on Friday, but many workers received stubs with zeroes.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, traveling on Saturday in Abu Dhabi, claimed that morale is good among US diplomats even as many work without pay. “We’re

doing our best to make sure it doesn’t impact our diplomacy,” he said.

Almost half of the State Department employees in the US and about one-quarter abroad have been furloughed during the shutdown. With the exception of certain local employees overseas, the rest are working without pay, like those tasked with supporting Pompeo’s trip, which has thus far taken him to Jordan, Iraq, Egypt and Bahrain, with additional stops to come.

An emergency declaration by Trump could break the stalemate by letting him use existing, unspent money to build the US-Mexico border wall, without needing congressional approval. Democrats oppose that step but may be unable to stop it. Many Republicans are wary, too.

Nevertheless the administration has accelerated planning for it. Officials explored diverting money from a range of accounts, including $13.9 billion given to the Army Corps of Engineers after last year’s deadly hurricanes and floods. That option appeared to lose steam following an outcry.

Other possibilities included tapping asset forfeiture funds, such as money seized from drug kingpins, according to a congressional Republican not authorized to speak publicly about private conversations. The White House also was eyeing military construction money, another politically difficult choice because it would take away from a backlog of hundreds of projects.

Trump has been counseled by outside advisers to move toward declaring a national emergency for the “crisis” that he says exists at the southern border. This, as polls suggest Trump is getting most of the blame for the shutdown.

But some in the White House are trying to apply the brakes. Jared Kushner was among those opposed to the declaration, arguing to his father-in-law that pursuing a broader immigration deal was a better option. A person familiar with White House thinking said that in meetings this past week, the message was that the administration is in no rush and wants to consider various options. The person was unauthorized to discuss private sessions and spoke on condition of anonymity. AP

first quarter and Opec+ remains committed to making “whatever is the right decision to balance the market.”

The volatility that became a feature in financial markets last year is expected to continue for oil in 2019. Prices could rise higher than $60 a barrel if consumers perceive a gap between supply and demand, according to Descalzi. Ruhmi predicts even sharper swings between $50 and $80 a barrel for the year.

Opec, led by Saudi Arabia, agreed to cut oil output this year to support prices. The group and its allies, known as Opec+, agreed to start cutting 1.2 million barrels of daily production this month to stem a surplus and stabilize the

market. Producers already reduced output by 600,000 barrels a day last December, Saudi Arabia’s energy minister Khalid Al-Falih said on Wednesday.

Iran waivers

THE effort to balance the market will be judged when demand usually increases in the second quarter, Oman’s Rumhi said. The timing coincides with the expected expiration of US sanctions waivers that allowed some buyers of Iranian crude to continue purchases.

US sanctions have cut Iran’s exports to about 1 million barrels a day from 2.7 million before sanctions were announced, Brian Hook, the US State Department’s special representative for Iran,

said in an interview.

“There’s a lot more to come.

We’re going to continue our path to get to zero,” Hook said. “We have to do it in the context of oil prices” So once again, global oil supply will be subject to decisions on Iran waivers made by the Trump administration, far from the traditional halls of power in Riyadh and Vienna that have policed a large portion of the world’s crude production since the 1960s.

If US sanctions curtailing Iran’s exports begin to crimp markets, the group will respond, Rumhi said. “There is a commitment by all of us to make sure there is no dent in the supply side. And if there’s oversupply, we cut that fat, as well.” Bloomberg News

Merkel seeks to heal rift over role of coal in Germany’s economy A NGELA MERKEL this week will seek to bridge divisions in Germany about how quickly to cut the nation’s reliance on coal, a controversial issue that has sparked violent clashes between green protesters and police and rattled its brittle governing coalition.

The chancellor will use a Tuesday dinner meeting in Berlin to press a panel plotting an exit from the world’s most widely used power-plant fuel to speed up plans after it requested an extension last December. The group made up of coal-state governors, industry lobbyists, union members and environmentalists has a February 1 deadline to spell out a comprehensive exit plan.

As Europe’s biggest economy is poised to miss its 2020 target to cut carbon emissions, the chancellor is struggling to balance climate-friendly pledges against demands from industry to protect jobs and consumer groups for cheaper energy. Utilities led by RWE AG and unions covering the mining, chemicals and metals industry warn that jobs will be lost and competitiveness hurt if Germany closes coal plants too quickly.

“The climate protection targets we have set ourselves have been missed,” said Claudia Kemfert, who follows energy policy at the DIW research institute in Berlin. “The proportion of Germany’s most environmentally harmful energy source—lignite—is too high. Merkel should use the end of her last term to put the energy and transport transition on a successful path.”

Coal accounts for just over 20 percent of Germany’s power-generation capacity. That level must be cut in half by the end of the next decade to meet the nation’s Paris Agreement pledge, according to Energy Minister Peter Altmaier. Germany expects to miss its target set in 2007 to slash emissions by 40 percent by 2020, a failure that would incur a fine from the European Union.

The missed targets are a personal embarrassment for Merkel, who served as environment minister early in her political career and has put the issue at the center of her agenda. Germany has spent an unprecedented €500 billion ($577 billion) on its “Energiewende” since 2000 to shift the economy toward cleaner sources of energy.

The group has a working scenario for a final coal exit in 2035 to 2038, winding down the industry in three stages from this year or next, according to the officials. Much of those reductions would come in the next few years, front-loading the pain, because Germany probably won’t meet the 2020 commitments.

The initial phase to 2022 may require the shuttering of as much as 16 to 17 gigawatts, or almost 40 percent of the total, focusing on hard coal generation in North RhineWestphalia. Germany’s industrial heartland is deemed better able to weather a roll back economically than the eastern lignite regions Brandenburg, Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt.

That would allow more polluting plants to keep operating for the time being in three eastern states, where jobs are more scarce.

The panel will likely squabble until the last minute to decide which plants and when they must close and how to compensate the companies that own those assets. But coal is slowly losing ground. Last year, renewable energy overtook the fuel for the first time as the nation’s biggest source of electricity in terms of output.

“Germany has made huge changes to how it generates electricity,” said Eric Schweitzer, president of the German Chambers of Commerce. “The downside is the very high costs that are testing German industry’s breaking

point. Electricity prices have doubled. This is in large part due to subsidies for renewable energy.”

Lobby groups for big energy consumers from automaker Volkswagen AG to steelmaker Thyssenkrupp AG complain that depending on renewables has pushed German power prices past the EU average.

Environmentalists, spurred by RWE’s decision to flatten a 12,000-year-old forest to mine coal, argue that Merkel needs to take a tougher line with the industry.

“Energy-intensive companies can only remain competitive and take important investment decisions when electr icity is affordable and there’s security of supply,” said Franziska Erdle, head of Germany’s metal producers association

WVMetalle. “Instead of costs continually rising, they need to fall.”

Electricity prices in Germany have been trading at their highest in six years since the middle of 2018, driven up both by rising costs of carbon-emissions allowances and by strong demand for coal and natural gas. Germany shares with Denmark the highest retail electricity prices in the EU-28, according to the EU Commission.

“If electricity prices continue to increase, that could lead to a structural collapse in energy-intensive industries,” said Utz Tillman, head of the nation’s chemical industry association VCI. “That would destroy Germany’s closely interlinked production chains. We need to start focusing on reducing costs.” Bloomberg News

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Monday, January 14, 2019 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

Opinion BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

editorial

PHL: A crude oil price slave

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HIS week—once again—we learn that the Philippines is an economic slave to global oil prices. As a result of Dubai crude climbing to the $59 per barrel range and European Brent crude already above the $60 per barrel price, fuel prices are going higher. Diesel products will be P2 per liter more, and gasoline products will have an increase of approximately P1.30 per liter.

Those with a political agenda—and little understanding of how this economy functions—will blame the administration. It is always easier to look for a scapegoat to a problem than to actually find solutions.

Homo sapiens have been around for 100,000 years and longer. But the correlation between population growth and the increasing use of crude oil is unmistakable. The same is true for global life expectancy and extreme poverty, child mortality and even literacy. The flat line growth of these began to strongly increase with the Industrial Revolution in the mid-1800s.

The world’s first oil refinery was built in 1856, distilling kerosene for lamps from seep oil. The first commercial oil well in Canada became operational in 1858. The first “modern” oil well was drilled in 1859 near Titusville, Pennsylvania.

We think of oil being used as the fuel for land transportation, and that accounts for 50 percent of worldwide demand. However, some 6,000 products are made from petroleum and petroleum by-products. Fifteen percent of crude oil is used to make petrochemicals that in turn are used to make the shirt on your back and the fertilizer and insecticides used in global agriculture.

While it ruins the narrative that government can control inflation, the global inflation rate trends up or down with oil prices. This is true for those nations where income from oil exports is not a significant part of the economy.

Of 98 countries, the Philippines ranks 68th in total oil production and 84th in per-capita output at 200 barrels per day. The nation is a slave to global crude oil prices.

By comparison, per-capita production is over 3,000 barrels per day in Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia, while over 20,000 barrels per day is produced in Malaysia. We do not have crude oil. That is the reality.

Unless the piggery owner wants to eat only pork, the poultry farmer only chicken and the baker only bread, then they must sell their production to buy products from others. The Philippines must stop being at the mercy of the oil producers and must exploit our natural mineral resources.

The harvesting of all natural resources from timber to fish to minerals and oil comes with environmental problems. That is unavoidable but must be properly managed. Japan does not have oil resources and has built its manufacturing base to avoid being an oil slave. But the need to run its factories requires “cheap” electricity and nuclear power plants.

The idea that the Philippines can substitute oil with “renewable energy sources” is a fantasy. In 1973 the global total primary energy supply mix included hydroelectric (1.8 percent), biofuels and waste (10.5 percent), and wind and solar (0.1 percent). Today, after billions of dollars of government and private spending and even with technological breakthroughs, the mix is hydroelectric at 2.5 percent, biofuels and waste at 9.8 percent, and wind and solar at 1.7 percent.

The time for inaction is over. The government must plan, implement and enforce environmentally sound mining policies. Otherwise, no one gets to complain about the negative economic effects if and when crude oil goes to $100 or more per barrel.

The role of businesses in educating our kids Atty. Jose Ferdinand M. Rojas II

RISING SUN

T

HIS column was inspired by something that I read from the WE Forum site about the changing landscape of work and the role of businesses in making sure that our kids today are equipped with the right skills to meet the challenges of the future.

Indeed, we can’t leave it all up to the schools and the governments because the industries have more to gain from educating the future members of their work force.

First, let’s look at the figures. All over the world, there are about 1.8 billion people who are between ages 10 and 24. Every month, about 10 million people reach working age, but the world does not create 10 million new jobs every month. And this is where the problem lies. There are 71 million unemployed young people

Precautionary Hold Departure Order Atty. Lorna Patajo-Kapunan

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all over the world. Plus, 156 million who are actually working and live on less than $3 a day.

Aside from this, the fact is that the skills that these young people possess do not match the skill requirements of the available jobs. This is especially true in poor countries and in places where the education

system leaves much to be desired.

Another fact: six out of 10 children and adolescents worldwide do not achieve minimum proficiency in reading and math. Adolescents who are out of school number about 200 million globally.

The children need foundational skills (literacy and numeracy), transferable skills (problem-solving, confidence-building, teambuilding and communication), job-specific skills (for example, carpentry, coding, accounting, engineering, etc.), entrepreneurial skills and digital skills.

The good news is that businesses can do something to give children better opportunities. For example, they can increase the quality and the number of apprenticeships and mentorships that they offer, and provide training in those skills and areas that their business actually needs. They can even target the youth from the communities, the disadvantaged and the less privileged.

LEGALLY SPEAKING

T

HE Supreme Court issued A.M. 18-07-05 SC on August 7, 2018, that laid down a new rule that would prevent people suspected of committing a crime from going out of the country. Voting 11-1, the SC (under then-Acting Chief Justice Antonio T. Carpio) approved The Rule on Precautionary Hold Departure Order (PHDO), OCA Circular 194-2018, in place of a watch list order (WLO) by the Department of Justice (DOJ).

Associate Justice Marvie Leonen was the lone dissenter.

The SC issued the new rule after it struck down the power of the DOJ to prevent the flights of respondents facing criminal complaints under DOJ Circular 41. The new rule of the SC strips the DOJ of such powers. It is now the investigating prosecutor who can file with the appropriate court for a PHDO. In an earlier April 2018 decision, the Supreme Court granted the petitions of former President and current House Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo and former Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. Chairman Ephrain Genuino and his two children to declare as unconstitutional DOJ Circular 41 for being violative of the right to travel under Article III, Section 6, of the 1987 Constitution. The DOJ Circular had been used by then-Justice Secretary and now detained Sen. Leila M. de Lima in issuing WLOs to prevent them from leaving the country back in 2011 in connection

with an ongoing investigation on election fraud they allegedly committed. In its July 17, 2018, ruling, the SC affirmed its April decision that DOJ Department Circular 41, which allows the DOJ to issue Hold Departure Orders (HDOs), WLOs and Allow Departure Order (ADOs) is unconstitutional for violating the right to travel.

A PHDO is an order in writing issued by a court commanding the Bureau of Immigration to prevent any attempt by a person suspected of a crime to depart from the Philippines, which shall be issued ex-parte in cases involving crimes where the minimum of the penalty prescribed by law is at least six years and one day, or when the offender is a foreigner regardless of the imposable penalty. (Section 1 OCA 194-2018) “The application for a precautionary hold departure order may be filed by a prosecutor with any Regional Trial Court within whose

territorial jurisdiction the alleged crime was committed: Provided, that for compelling reasons, it can be filed with any Regional Trial Court within the judicial region where the crime was committed if the place of the commission of the crime is known; Provided, further, that the Regional Trial Courts in the City of Manila, Quezon City Cebu City, Iloilo City, Davao City and Cagayan de Oro City shall also have the authority to act on applications filed by the prosecutor based on complaints instituted by the National Bureau of Investigation, regardless where the alleged crime was committed.”

(Section 2) “Upon motion by the complainant in a criminal complaint filed before the office of the city or provincial prosecutor, and upon a preliminary determination of probable cause based on the complaint and attachments, the investigating prosecutor may file an application in the name of the People of the Philippines for a PHDO with the proper Regional Trial Court. The application shall be accompanied by the complaint-affidavit and its attachments, personal details, passport number and a photograph of the respondent, if available.”

(Section 3) “A precautionary hold departure order shall not issue except upon determination by the judge, in whose court the application is filed, that probable cause exists, and there is a high probability that respondent will depart from the Philippines to evade arrest and prosecution of crime against him or her. The judge shall personally examine under oath or affirmation, in the form of

Another step that businesses can take is to work with schools and community groups to improve education by creating programs that focus on the needed skills.

Businesses (through their employees) can participate in Career Day events to share advice and experiences with the students. Finally, businesses can also promote policies that support the family, the women and the disadvantaged so that everyone gets equal opportunity.

If we don’t work together to help our children, it’s not only them and their families that will suffer. It’s not just the organizations, too, but also the economy and the country, the region and the whole world. Unemployment will rise, and more workers will find themselves trapped in low-skill jobs. It is in everyone’s best interest to support the youth to get the training and education they need to be able to make it in the new work environment.

searching questions and answers in writing, the applicant and the witnesses he or she may produce on facts personally known to them and attaching to the record their sworn statements.

If the judge finds that probable cause exists and there is a high probability that the respondent will depart, he or she shall issue the PHDO and direct the Bureau of Immigration to hold and prevent the departure of the respondent at any Philippine airport or ports. Otherwise, the judge shall order the dismissal of the application.” (Section 4) “Since the finding of probable cause by the judge is solely based on the complaint and is specifically issued for the purpose of issuing the PHDO, the same shall be without prejudice to the resolution of the prosecutor of the criminal complaint considering the complaintaffidavit, counter-affidavit, replyaffidavit and the evidence presented by both parties during the preliminary investigation. If the prosecutor after preliminary investigation dismisses the criminal complaint for lack of probable cause, then the respondent may use the dismissal as a ground for the lifting of the PHDO with the Regional Trial Court that issued the order. If the prosecutor finds probable cause and files the criminal information, the case with the court that issued the PHDO, on motion of the prosecutor shall be consolidated with the court where the criminal information is filed.”

(Section 5) “The precautionary hold departure order shall indicate the name of the respondent, his or her alleged See “Kapunan,” A7

Opinion BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Pending legislations that Both of Us can affect your business Siegfred Bueno Mison, Esq.

THE PATRIOT

Jeffrey Galang Salazar

DEBIT CREDIT

Y

ear 2019 is here. With the tax reform and other relevant pending legislations, it is the time to consider the pending bills in Congress that may impact business operations.

With the objective of redesigning Philippine taxation to become a simpler and fairer system, the much-awaited phase 2 of the tax reform package also known as Tax Reform for Attracting Better and High-Quality Opportunities under House Bill 8083 is in the Congressional pipeline. Companies under special laws will be the most affected because of the sunset provision of their tax exemption privileges, while private educational institutions must comply with certain criteria to be established by the Department of Education and Commission on Higher Education for these schools to continuously enjoy their current preferential income tax rate of 10 percent. The good news for corporations will be the gradual decrease of corporate income tax rate from 30 to 20 percent beginning 2019 up to 2029.

Another pending legislation is Senate Bill (SB) 2059 or the tax amnesty bill. The purpose of the said bill is to provide one-time opportunity for taxpayers to settle their tax obligations through an amnesty program, which will cover taxable year 2017 and prior periods. Those availing themselves of tax amnesty can choose either to pay the 2-percent tax on total assets or 5 percent of net worth that will be declared by taxpayers. There will also be an amnesty on estate tax at 6 percent of the estate tax value. The proposed bill also provides for certain restrictions on who are excluded from the tax amnesty program such as but not limited to those with tax evasion cases, issues of graft and corruption, violation of the antimoney laundering law, fraud and other similar cases.

SB 1280 is an act amending the

Kapunan. . .

continued from A6

crime, the time and place of its commission, and the name of the complainant. A copy of the application, personal details, passport number, photograph of the respondent, if available, shall be appended to the order. The order shall be valid until lifted by the issuing court as may be warranted by the result of the preliminary investigation.

The court shall furnish the Bureau of Immigration with a duly certified copy of the hold departure order within 24 hours from issuance.” (Section 6) “The respondent may file a verified motion before the issuing court for the temporary lifting of PHDO on meritorious ground; that, based on the complaint-affidavit and the evidence that he or she will present, there is doubt

Corporate Code of the Philippines.

The objective of this bill is to simplify the registration of corporation by introducing a one-person corporation and provide a perpetual life for corporations.

Companies that employ seasonal and/or contractual employees must also prepare for the possible impact of SB 1826 or the Security of Tenure bill, which will prohibit the contractualization practices and labor-only contracting.

House Bill 6770 which is already approved on third and final reading aims to increase the current Service Incentive Leaves of employees with at least one year of tenure with the company from five to 10 days.

To prolong the life of Social Security System and to meet its current pension obligations, SB 1753 seeks to gradually increase social security contributions by one percent every two years starting 2019 up to 2025.

After these increases, the contribution will be at 15 percent from the present 11 percent.

These changes are inevitable. It is the responsibility of the company to maximize the possible benefits that can be derived, as well as to mitigate the risks associated with these pieces of legislation. Let us all hope that 2019 will be prosperous and beneficial not only to businesses but to our nation and its citizens.

This column accepts contributions from accountants, especially articles that are of interest to the accountancy profession, in particular, and to the business community, in general. These can be e-mailed to boa.secretariat.@gmail.com.

Jeffrey Galang Salazar is a Certified Public Accountant and a Master in Business Administration degree holder. He is a PRC-BOA accredited public practitioner and professor.

that probable cause exists to issue the PHDO or it is shown that he or she is not a flight risk: Provided, that the respondent posts a bond; Provided, further, that the lifting of the PHDO is without prejudice to the resolution of the preliminary investigation against the respondent.” (Section 7) “Respondent may ask the issuing court to allow him or her to leave the country upon posting of a bond in an amount to be determined by the court subject to the conditions set forth in the Order granting the temporary lifting of the PHDO.” (Section 8) The new rule on precautionary hold departure order is a welcome reform in the criminal justice system. It is hoped that there will be more to come. But then again, reforms will be inutile if those who are tasked with dispensing justice remain corrupt. They are the ones who need to be reformed!

W

hen you Google the words “Both of Us,” you get on top of about 6,570,000,000 results of a song featuring pop singer-songwriter Taylor Swift. I have little recollection of such song. Maybe my children know it. But I first encountered the term Both of Us when Natasia Cunanan, a former colleague at the Bureau of Immigration, introduced me to her partner in life and in music, Sherman. They have been singing together since their school days. With Natasia on vocals and Sherman on guitar, the duo is now known as BOU. Their cover rendition of “More Than Words” has been used as a theme song for a popular Korean telenovela. BOU held a benefit concert a few days ago to raise funds for Natasia’s sick mother Ruby. Some of their friends in the music industry, such as Angeline Quinto and Benj Manalo, also shared their talents to support a worthy cause.

The repertoire of BOU songs during that enchanted evening was all about the different stages of love relationships. From the early stages of friendship and falling in love (“Game Of Love” by Michelle Branch, “Love Story” by Taylor Swift, “Getting To Know Each Other” by Ariel Rivera) to being heartbroken and letting go (“If The Feeling Is Gone” by Ella May Saison, “Love Of My Life” by Queen, “You’ve Made Me Stronger”

by Regine Velasquez), from moving on (“Someone Like You” by Adele, “The Climb” by Miley Cyrus) to loving again (“Can’t Stop The Feeling”

by Justin Timberlake). BOU also

sang a few of their original songs and, owing to my platinum blond hair, my supposed favorite song as well, “Kahit Maputi Na Ang Buhok Ko” by Rey Valera.

But one of the highlights of the evening for me was when guest performer Katrina Velarde sang “Never Enough,” a hit song from the movie The Greatest Showman. While the lyrics evoked the human emotion of always wanting more despite having enough, Velarde invoked the need to have a personal relationship with our God. Before singing the song, she said that all of us will have “Never Enough” unless we seek God in our

Bloomberg Opinion

I

t was mendacious, petty, deeply cynical and full of contradictions —and just possibly the most honest expression of a US administration’s policy in the Middle East by a top American official.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s speech in Cairo will win no hearts and change no minds among his imagined audience, the Arab world. Most Arabs will have paid it no heed at all, since Pompeo is widely regarded as having

no wasta (connection or influence) on the Trump administration’s Middle East policy. (Had this speech come from the man who does, Jared Kushner, it might have received much more attention.) But those who did listen would have concluded that it more accurately reflects the administration’s view of their region than anything they’ve heard before.

There was, to be sure, the occasional bromide about the US being a “force for good” in the region, but Pompeo spared his audience the invocations of American values that most Arabs have come to regard as insincere sanctimony

lives. In the Bible, Matthew 6:33 tells us, “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you, as well.”

Believers are taught that the pursuit of God first will inevitably lead to the fulfillment of material needs. Hence, believers ought to live without worry or anxiety. To make the pursuit more worthwhile and effective, I suppose both of our spiritual and physical being must be one and united in terms of seeking Him. Unless both our flesh and our spirit are one and at peace, we will have more difficulty in finding Him and eventually stop telling ourselves “Never Enough.”

I asked Natasia why the duo has chosen Both of Us as their name. In her words, Both of Us represents that both Natasia and Sherman “agree in many aspects of life, both personally and professionally.” Finding love and staying in love would require some form of harmony, or peaceful coexistence, at the very least. Otherwise, married couples or partners separate.

Similarly, in our personal lives, our physical self would almost always disagree with our conscience. There is hardly any peaceful coexistence of both goodness and evil in any person unless he has a split personality like Jekyll and Hyde. Therefore, the key for goodness to prevail is to be more mindful of the presence of the Spirit that dwells within us. In the Bible, Romans 7:18 tells us: “For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.” The “Both of Us” in

our inner selves is just as difficult to harmonize as the “Both of Us” in love relationships. There will be a constant struggle considering the inherent differences between the two as it is written in the Bible in Romans 7:19-20, “For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.”

But as for Natasia, I think she has learned how to have peace, both with her partner Sherman and with her inner self, by simply trusting Him in everything she does. When she was still an immigration officer, she was never involved in any nefarious or corrupt activities. Although she needed extra funds to pay for the medical treatment of her mother who has brain tumor, Natasia stayed the course. Her integrity was never compromised. Former United States President Abraham Lincoln once said, “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.” I am proud to have seen how Natasia has withstood the temptations of power and how she kept her own Both of Us (sinful mind and a good conscience) tilted in favor of goodness. People might perceive Natasia as a saint with her sweet and angelic voice. But what she has done for the Bureau and for her sick mother Ruby makes her close to one.

For questions and comments, please e-mail me at sbmison@gmail.com.

German central bank remains optimistic

O

By Peter Lundgreen

n December 17, 2018, the German central bank, Bundesbank, issued its monthly economic report. For a somewhat depressed financial market, the analysis from the central bank should have served as an optimistic Christmas gift.

The particularly interesting feature in the December monthly report is that Bundesbank projects a solid GDP growth in Germany until 2021. Should the central bank be right, then it is time to buy European stocks, and in general, upgrade the trust in the Eurozone’s economic future.

Bundesbank predicts rising GDP growth rates until 2020, followed by a lower growth rate in 2021. This is an incredibly interesting forecast when one considers that a recession in the US in 2020 is being feared in the financial markets. In addition, Italy is struggling just to stay at a zero-growth level, France is getting closer to a stalemate situation, and the Spanish economy is less buoyant than a year ago. The Bundesbank prediction, therefore, seems particularly optimistic. However, I always include analysis from the Bundesbank in my own considerations because it is absolutely insightful, and because of the skilled people who work in the central bank’s economic department.

The Bundesbank estimates that the growth in the second half of 2018 would accelerate again due to higher activity in the automotive industry. Last summer, production fell due to uncertainty about emission limitations for diesel-powered cars in Germany. Bundesbank had an expectation about a clarification concerning the diesel cars’ emission and possible bans on driving diesel cars in major German cities. Though Bundesbank notes that only demand

from abroad increased, domestic purchases of new cars lagged also into the fourth quarter.

Those who follow the German news may have noticed that the battle for, or against, diesel cars has evolved into a kind of warfare scene, thus far from the clarification that the Bundesbank presupposes.

A nother cha llenge for the Bundesbank’s expectation of a solid GDP growth is the downward momentum in the economy during 2018. In the second half of 2018, all German economic think tanks lowered the growth estimate for Germany, the Bundesbank itself also lowered expectations for the 2018 GDP growth from 2 percent to 1.5 percent. At the same time, there is no doubt that the headwind for the global economy is currently increasing. For the same reason, 2019 opens up with several headwinds, confirming the instant decreasing momentum in growth rates.

But as the Bundesbank emphasizes, a new positive element for growth in 2019 is the increasing expansionary fiscal policy that the government coalition originally agreed upon when they formed the government

Pompeo gives Arabs a dose of Trump cynicism

By Bobby Ghosh

Monday, January 14, 2019 A7

—the more so since President Barack Obama’s quick retreat from the pieties that freighted his 2009 Cairo address.

Pompeo’s speech was also refreshingly uncontaminated by faux sympathy for—much less support of—the aspirations of ordinary Arabs. The secretary of state professed no interest in his audience’s greatest concerns: the scarcity of economic opportunity, good governance and social justice, or the abundance of corruption and repression. There was only a desultory appeal to Egyptian president AbdelFattah el-Sisi, to “unleash the creative

energy of Egypt’s people, unfetter the economy, and promote a free and open exchange of ideas.”

Remarkably, the word “democracy” only once escaped Pompeo’s lips, and then only tangentially, in a reference to Iraq. The only other Arab democracy, Tunisia, didn’t come up at all. (Obama, by contrast, devoted an entire section of his speech to the promotion of democracy.) The region’s despots, on the other hand, received fulsome praise— none more than El-Sisi, whom he hailed as a steadfast partner in the fight against terrorism, as well as a champion

two years ago. I agree that this is going to act as a stabilizing growth factor, but overall, I argue that the economic activity in Germany will be at a lower level than what the Bundesbank expects.

The expectation of rising growth rates this year and next year is exciting, and the Bundesbank even uses the phrase “continued economic boom,” which sounds appealing in these times. In the argument it refers to a global stable economic situation, where I believe the problems are mounting, especially in Italy, France and Spain.

On the horizon, Bundesbank also believes that the fiscal policy can contribute positively to growth. I agree that Germany still has fiscal power to release, if growth becomes too low.

There’s an increasing rise in net wages after tax and social contributions in Germany, which means that household consumption can still grow. The labor market is so robust, that this will last for some time to come. Whether this still is the situation in three years is a good question, but it remains as a positive GDP growth effect right now.

Looking at the components of Bundesbank’s expectations for the future GDP growth, the figure for 2020 contains a so-called base effect of 0.4 percentage points (like a calendar effect). One can argue that the growth has taken place, but most people will probably perceive the growth as stable, instead of increasing—I agree that several small growth engines will contribute positively, but again, at a more modest level than how the central bank rates the future.

I wish that the Bundesbank will

be right in its assessment, but as indicated a few times, I remain less optimistic than the highly respectable German central bank. I do not disagree with the arguments in the monthly report, but I weigh them differently, and moreover, I give more weight to the immediate headwinds and the European challenges.

My own assessment of the global economy, though especially the Eurozone economy, has long been more modest than what the financial markets have priced in. However, since my assessment is relatively unchanged, it now suddenly seems almost optimistic, but it is not the Bundesbank’s optimism I share.

I argue that the United States will continue to show a reasonable GDP growth, and the recent 2020 recession debate as exaggerated, but the current growth rate will slow down at some point.

I’m considerably more sceptical about the Eurozone. To keep the momentum, the future GDP growth in Germany must be increasingly generated by domestic economic growth.

It is not the first time in history that Germany will act as the stabilizing economic factor in Europe, now distinctly in the Eurozone. Overall, Germany’s growth contribution to the Eurozone will assure the economic zone against a recession, which is good, and can keep up the mood of an optimist. But the growth in Germany will not be strong enough to hinder the Eurozone to fade into a low growth situation that feels like stagnation for a number of years ahead.

of religious freedom.

Pompeo saved his broadsides for the regime in Tehran and its “deadly ambitions,” and declared that the US would “use diplomacy and work with our partner to expel every last Iranian boot” from Syria. And he promised that the Trump administration would keep up the fight against Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), suggesting this could be done mostly from the air.

This may have mystified his audience: unlike their leaders, most Arabs regard Iran as a very distant threat. And, having seen a Saudi-led coalition fail

to defeat Yemen’s Houthi rebels with a campaign heavily reliant on airpower, they will rightly question the US ability to eliminate ISIS in that fashion.

Still, there is virtue in knowing the Trump administration’s worldview, and Pompeo certainly provided that.

Arab listeners who listened through to the end will reasonably have concluded that the speech was less about what the administration stands for, and more about what it is against: Iran, Obama’s policies, and terrorism…more or less in that order.

They’d be right.

The author is the Founding CEO of Lundgreen’s Capital, a professional investment advisory company.

2nd Front Page BusinessMirror

A8 Monday, January 14, 2019

Collection in 9 months under TRAIN 94.7% of target: DOF

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By Rea Cu

@ReaCuBM

EVENUE collections for the first three quarters of 2018—with the implementation of the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion law—were slightly below target, but the finance secretary said that point is eclipsed by the fact that the TRAIN law put more money in the pockets of Filipinos by cutting personal income taxes (PIT).

The Department of Finance (DOF) reported that revenue collections of the government’s main collection agencies reached P41.9 billion in the nine months after TRAIN took effect on January 1, 2018.

“For the entire TRAIN law, we collected P41.9 billion, that’s only for TRAIN for the first three quarters.

The target for the period was P44.3 billion. I want to emphasize that the big number there is the reduction

on PIT. The reduction for the PIT for the first nine months is P102.9 billion,that is around close to P12 billion a month. That means to say that individuals had actually P12 billion a month spending power,” Dominguez pointed out to reporters.

The revenue collections from the TRAIN law of P41.9 billion during the nine-month period met 94.7 percent of its programmed target for the same period amounting to

₧63.3B

The DOF’s annual target collection under TRAIN for the full year. The DOF thinks this can be met, citing improved collection performance of the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs P44.3 billion.

“Don’t look at only the collection, look at what was given up, and they were given up directly to individuals.... So the TRAIN has succeeded 100 percent in that regard. In the collections for the first nine months, we succeeded 94.7 percent. In any grading, it’s not so bad,” he added.

Broken down, collections from oil excise taxes hit P43.4 billion versus a P43.3-billion target; excise tax slapped on automobiles reached P12.2 billion versus a target of P11.6 billion; tobacco excise collections were P5.9 billion versus P3.30-billion target; corporate

C

At least 37 Chinese nationals were excluded for rudeness; second on the list were 25 American nationals, followed by 23 Koreans.

Medina reminded foreign nationals entering the country that their entry and stay in the country “is only a privilege, not a right.”

“Aliens are not allowed to verbally abuse or disrespect our immigration officers,” he stressed.

Medina advised foreigners visiting the country not to be discour-

TROUGH OF A LOW PRESSURE AREA AFFECTING MINDANAO NORTHEAST MONSOON AFFECTING LUZON AND VISAYAS as of 4:00 am - January 13, 2019

teous and avoid using foul and indecent language when talking to immigration officers whom they encounter in the ports of entry.

The 133 foreign nationals were included in the immigration blacklist of undesirable aliens. As a consequence, they are banned from re-entering the country.

BI Spokesman Dana Sandoval said the agency is strictly implementing a policy to disallow the entry of foreigners who exhibit

CONDIMENTS FEEDING STEADY RISE IN PHL CARDIOVASCULAR CASES

income tax, P800 million versus P400-million target; and documentary tax stamp (DST), P49.1 billion versus P21-billion target.

“We are going over the different items, some we exceeded, some we did not. You have to remember that the estimates are estimates.

Example, we exceeded the DST collection by P500 million, you know why? The estimate was wrong. Why was it wrong, because we had very little time to estimate, we didn’t have enough data.... Some of the estimates were good, some of the estimates were not so good,” he said.

Unmet targets

MEANWHILE, revenue collections that failed to meet their respective target estimates under the TRAIN law include: sugar-sweetened beverages at P31.2 billion versus P43.3billion target; other excise taxes, P2.3 billion versus P3.1-billion target; value-added tax at P3.6 billion versus P24.8-billion target; and financial taxes at P2.4 billion, versus P5.2-billion target.

See “TRAIN,” A2

Chinese, then Americans, top ‘rude’ list of BI HINESE nationals topped the list of foreigners barred by the Bureau of Immigration from entering the country for displaying rudeness and disrespect toward immigration officers.

In a report to Immigration Commissioner Jaime Morente, BI Port Operations Division Chief Grifton Medina said the number of rude aliens who were turned back slightly went up from 129 in 2017 to 133 last year.

www.businessmirror.com.ph

arrogance or make offensive utterances against immigration officers, the latter being symbols of Philippine authority.

The policy, she said, is based on the memorandum order that thenBI chief Andrea Domingo issued on March 29, 2001.

The memorandum provides for not just the exclusion of a disrespectful foreign passenger but also his inclusion in the immigration blacklist. Joel R. San Juan

Clergy slams Rody’s callout to mob to rob, kill bishops

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HURCH officials on Sunday slammed anew President Duterte for his latest controversial remark against the Catholic Church, this time urging bystanders to rob and kill bishops.

Commission on Mission Chairman Bishop Arturo Bastes was appalled by the latest attempt of Duterte to trivialize murder.

Duterte made the remark on Thursday during an event in Masbate, which made his audience laugh. He admitted he was irked by the Catholic Church’s allegations that the government’s war on illegal drugs led to widespread extrajudicial killings.

“Again his mouth has uttered absolutely silly things! And his ‘fans’ consider his murderous words as a mere joke! Is it a joke to advise people to kill?” Bastes said.

Commission on Migrants and Itinerant People Chairman Bishop Ruperto Santos said the President was promoting criminality and encouraging lawlessness.

“What kind of head of state encourages killing? His presidency is a disappointment to us, and a disgrace to the country. It is known as ‘kill, kill, kill,’” Santos said.

Both prelates said the latest tirade of Duterte against the Catholic Church should be condemned for setting a bad example to the public.

“There should be a mass movement among decent Filipinos to make him desist from speaking like a devil,” Bastes said.

In Duterte’s defense, Chief Presidential Legal Counsel and Presidential Spokesman Salvador S. Panelo said the remark was only aimed at bishops who lead ostentatious lives and fail to empathize with the masses.

Despite his “dramatic” remark against the prelates, Duterte respects the Christian faith as shown by his signing of the National Bible Day Act and speech for the Black Nazarene Devotees last week.

Panelo said. Samuel P. Medenilla

DR. EDUARDO C. JANAIRO (right), director IV for Calabarzon of the Department of Health, receives a certificate of appreciation from Dr. Alberto Atilano after speaking at the PhilPen Summit on Cardiovascular Risk Assessment and Management Initiative in cooperation with the Philippine Society of Hypertension in Tagaytay City. The DOH’s regional chief flagged the steady rise in cardiovascular cases in the country, citing the importance of educating people to make lifestyle changes. ROY DOMINGO

By Cai U. Ordinario @caiordinario

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N incurable love for condiments and salty viands has emerged as a major factor for why heart disease remains among the top killers of Filipinos nationwide, according to experts from the Department of Health (DOH) and the Philippine General Hospital (PGH).

During the recent PhilPen Summit, DOH Disease Prevention and Control Bureau Medical Officer Carmela N. Granada said many Filipinos continue to use condiments such as soy sauce when eating salty viands. This raises the risk of them developing hypertension, which increases the risk for cardiovascular events such as stroke or cardiac failure.

Based on DOH data, there are around 938,655 Filipinos who are included in the hypertension and diabetes registry in the Philippines.

This, however, only includes patients receiving medicines from public health centers.

“We haven’t captured yet half of it. The prevalence of hypertension is 23.9 percent. The one showed by Dr. Debbie [Deborah Ignacia D. Ona of the UP PGH] is actually 2013, which is 22.3 percent, so that’s roughly about 12 to 13 million adults. What we have registered right now is [less than a] million,” Granada told the BusinessMirror.

Uncontrolled hypertension IN a presentation, Ona said that another problem is uncontrolled hypertension. She said preliminary 2017 data of a DOH health survey showed that 34.3 percent of participants had hypertension.

However, participants with hypertension and not receiving treatment accounted for 14 percent while participants receiving treatment but have uncontrolled hypertension, 41.6 percent.

Apart from unhealthy diets, risk factors that cause hypertension include family history; old age; gender, specifically male; and low socioeconomic, educational status, according to Ona. Granada said that while it was true that consuming healthier foods may be costly, continuing bad habits, such as unhealthy diets, will cost more in the long run.

Peza. . .

Continued from A1

The uncertainties also failed to hamper the performance of locators, as their export receipts from January to October of last year grew 6.58 percent to $45.17 billion ,from $42.38 billion during the same period last year. Direct employment also increased 7.33 percent to 1.49 million from 1.39 million.

“Peza industries export income [and] employment did not drop, but continuously increased because [the locators] are maximizing their production before [the] Trabaho bill, which might change the policies,

DOH Calabarzon Director Eduardo Janairo told the BusinessM irror on the sidelines of the event that eating healthy can actually be cheap, if people make better spending choices and veer away from unhealthy options such as fast food or processed food.

“When it comes to [a healthy] diet, you do not need to spend a lot. You have access to cheaper options. In NCR, when I was the director there, P100 could feed a family of six per day but they are healthy,” Janairo said.

Apart from food choices, Filipinos need to veer away from vices such as smoking. Janairo said that while the sin taxes helped improve government revenues, it was not successful in forcing older smokers to quit.

What happened was, most of these smokers just chose a different and cheaper brand to continue their vice, Janairo said. The only consolation was that millennials now are more aware of the health risks of smoking.

Granada said what is important is that the government is able to give Filipinos, especially millennials, a reason to believe they will benefit from keeping a healthy lifestyle.

“We need to teach them what are the benefits of living healthy. They may spend more now [for healthier choices] but it will lead to greater savings in the next five to 10 years because they will not get sick,” Granada said.

Based on 2016 data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), ischaemic heart disease was the top leading cause of death with 74,134, or 12.7 percent of the total deaths in that year.

The second top cause was neoplasm’s, commonly known as “cancer” with 60,470 or 10.4 percent, followed by pneumonia with 57,809 or 9.9 percent for both sexes.

Among males, ischaemic heart diseases was also the top leading cause of death with 44,472 or 13.3 percent, followed by cerebrovascular diseases at 31,675 deaths, or 9.5 percent then neoplasms at 29,516 deaths or 8.8 percent.

For females, the top cause of death was neoplasm or“cancer”with 30,954, or 12.5 percent, followed by ischaemic heart diseases with 29,662 with 12 percent; then pneumonia, with 28,816 or 11.6 percent of the total.

[takes] effect,” Plaza explained.

Still, she told senators to assess the impact of the Trabaho bill on investments before they decide to pass the measure. She also assured her constituents—the firms in economic zones— that the Peza is “doing its best to retain the incentives that are working and even enhance the existing, so we become very competitive with other countries in attracting investors.”

“Peza industries are exporters and are efficiency seekers, so they weigh the advantages and disadvantages of countries’ incentives and other factors [for] production given the huge capital investments they will [bring to] the country of their choice,” Plaza pointed out.

Editor: Efleda P. Campos

Companies BusinessMirror

Monday, January 14, 2019

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PSE to develop derivative products with Singapore counterpart bourse

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By VG Cabuag

@villygc

HE Philippine Stock Exchange Inc. (PSE) said it made a deal with the Singapore Exchange Ltd. (SGX) to develop listed derivative products that offer international investors greater variety in accessing the Philippine equity market.

risk and allocate capital,” SGX CEO Loh Boon Chye said.

The Asean, which includes some of the world’s best-performing emerging markets, presents immense opportunities for international investors, the PSE said. If taken as a single country, with a population of more than 600 million, the bloc will have over $2 trillion, ranking it among the 10-largest economies globally.

The PSE will work with the Securities and Exchange Commission and other stock market stakeholders to develop rules and regulations for listing and trading derivative products, it said.

In a related development, the PSE has adopted measures to ensure it will remain compliant with the prescribed ownership limit on its shares. The Securities Regulation Code (SRC) mandates that no industry or business may beneficially own or control, directly or indirectly, more than 20 percent of the voting rights of the exchange.

“We intend to observe the prescribed broker ownership limit in the PSE by putting in place safeguards

that will help us with this goal,” Monzon said.

Among the measures in place are real-time broker ownership monitoring through the trading system, updating of Customer Account Information (CAI) Form of clients of stockbrokerage firms, submission of a monthly certification of Trading Participant’s (TP) related person accounts with corresponding PSE shareholdings, and amending the PSE Rules Governing Trading Rights and Trading Participants.

The PSE configured its trading system to automatically prevent the posting of a buy order for PSE shares from accounts that will push it over the 20-percent threshold, or if it is still below 20 percent but the matching of the buy order will cause broker industry ownership to breach the 20-percent level.

The PSE also requires stockbrokerage firms to update their CAI Form to disclose the relationship of clients to other trading participants, i.e., the directors, officers and principal stockholders of other broker dealers.

The PSE and SGX are working together to develop new Philippine equity index derivatives for listing on the Philippine bourse, it said.

A memorandum of understanding was signed between the two exchanges in 2013, which paved the way for the listing of SGX-PSE MSCI Philippines Index Futures on SGX in November that year.

“We are laying the groundwork for development of derivative products to enable the PSE to offer a more diverse product line to investors and

help us catch up with peer exchanges.

Our partnership with SGX will allow us to learn from their experience in operating a derivatives market,” PSE President and CEO Ramon S. Monzon said.

“We are pleased to broaden our cooperation with the PSE to advance the Philippine derivatives market. As domestic and international markets are complementary, this enhances our role in increasing access into Asean and emerging Asia, as well as providing tools for clients to manage

Bulacan Bulk Water begins commercial operations

DOLE to identify industries covered by telecommuting law

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HE P24.4-billion Bulacan Bulk Water Supply Project (BBWSP) is commencing commercial operations on Monday, January 14, following the project’s phase 1 milestone completion ahead of schedule.

In a statement, Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) Administrator Reynaldo V. Velasco lauded San Miguel Corp.

(SMC), a proponent of the BBWSP in partnership with the Clean Water Development Corp. and K-Water Resources Corp. Velasco credited SMC Chairman and CEO Ramon S. Ang for the speedy completion of the flagship project, the first major water project to be completed and inaugurated under the Duterte administration.

Duterte is set to formally inaugurate the BBWSP on January 28, 2019.

“We congratulate SMC, K-Water and Mr. Ang for the landmark completion of the BBWPS last December 17, one month ahead of its contracted completion,” Velasco said in a statement.

“This underscores the good working relations between MWSS and Luzon Clean Water that will surely benefit the people of Bulacan. While the Bulacan bulk-water project was started by the Aquino administration in 2012, it is the first major water project to be completed during Duterte’s term,” he said.

“The BBWSP started its dry-run operations last December 17, initially giving free water to four areas in Bulacan, namely, Obando, Meycauayan City, Marilao and Bocaue,” said Ang, who is also president of Luzon Clean Water.

Ang said the water project is aimed at providing millions of residents from 24 localities in Bulacan ready access to fresh, potable surface water while balancing the competing needs of a growing population, industry, agriculture and the environment in the province.

“The Bulacan Bulk Water project is just one of the many projects SMC has in store under the Duterte administration,” Ang said, adding that “with our financial resources and technical capabilities, we promise to deliver several projects that support our fast economic growth.” One of these projects includes a new international airport to be constructed in Bulacan. Jonathan L. Mayuga

By Samuel P. Medenilla

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HE Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) said it will soon be identifying the industries to be covered by Republic Act (RA) 11165 or the telecommuting law.

In an interview, Labor Assistant Secretary Benjo M. Benavidez said this would be contained in the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of the newly signed law, which they will start drafting later this month or by next month.

“We are just waiting for the completion of the publication requirement of the law, before we could start with the IRR,” Benavidez said.

He said they will be tapping the members of the National Tripartite Industrial Peace Council (NTIPC) to the come out with the provisions of the IRR. Last week President Duterte signed into law RA 11165, which aims to encourage employees to voluntarily work from home with the permission of their employers.

Benavidez, however, noted the arrangement will likely not benefit certain industries like the manufacturing firms, which will require its workers to be on site in performing

their duties. Instead, he said it will be more applicable for office-based positions like writers, researchers and employees of a publication company.

Aside from industries, he said to be discussed in the NTIPC consultations will be the possible format of the contact for engaging in a workfrom-home scheme.

The labor official said they will be proposing for the creation of a standard employment contract “to make it easier for all parties,” but he said it will be ultimately decided by the stakeholders.

Under RA 11165, employers and their employees engaging in telecommuting must formalize it in a contract, which will then be submitted to the DOLE. Benavidez said this will allow them to ensure the provisions of the contract will be respected as well as monitor the number of firms, which will make use of telecommuting.

“If there are issues on the implementation of the contract, it will be initially handled by the grievance machinery of a company before it is submitted to the DOLE for conciliation and mediation,” Benavidez said.

He said the IRR will also contain provision on the occupational safety and health standards (OSHS) of tele-

commuting workers.

“Since OSHS usually depends on a workplace, we will set a specific minimum standards for them,” Benavidez said.

He explained RA 11165 will have no impact on the basic labor standards of telecommuting workers.

“The law provides a fair treatment provision. This means whatever benefit received by a worker in the traditional workplaces will be the same benefit to be given to the workers reporting at home or elsewhere,” Benavidez said.

He said these benefits include holiday pays, overtime pays, vacation leaves, membership to the labor union of company, and even security of tenure.

“I would like to highlight that what was changed under the new law is the workplace. Other than that, it [Labor Code] will still apply to them [telecommuting workers],” Benavidez said.

But Benavidez did admit the telecommuting arrangement will pose a challenge for them in terms of regulations.

“We have to contend with the fact that we cannot conduct workplace inspection. That is why we will depend on a complaints-based enforcement for this,” Benavidez said.

Smart gets ready for rollout of 4G network, now 71 percent complete

By Lorenz S. Marasigan @lorenzmarasigan

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MART Communications Inc. is beefing up the rollout of its 4G network, after transforming more than three-thirds of its base stations across the country to be capable of carrier aggregation technology.

Mario G. Tamayo, the company’s senior vice president for network planning and engineering, said his group has already deployed LTEAdvanced (LTE-A) technology in 71 percent of its 4G sites nationwide.

This means these base stations are employed with carrier aggregation technology, which allows for

the combination of two or more frequency bands to deliver faster mobile-data speeds.

Depending on their locations and the devices that customers are using, LTE-A sites may deliver two, three, four or five aggregates of frequency bands.

Hence, a user that uses a premium phone with built-in carrier aggregation technology in an LTE-A area may experience up to five times faster speeds than those that use lowerend smartphones in areas without LTE-A base stations.

Users may experience up for 500 Mbps of speed when in a five-band aggregate area.

“We are continuously improving

our network to provide world-class mobile Internet connectivity for our customers all over the country,” Tamayo said. Smart’s total LTE base station count across the country increased by 65 percent to about 14,400 in the first three quarters of 2018, while the number of 3G base stations on its network also increased to about 11,000 as of September 2018.

Tamayo said that apart from LTEA, Smart is also activating 4x4 Multiple Input, Multiple Output (Mimo) and 256 Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM) technologies in Metro Manila, which boost speeds by allowing more data to be carried across the network through more efficient use of spectrum.

LRWC to raise ₧5 billion from private placement

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EISURE and Resorts World Corp. (LRWC) may raise as much as P5 billion through a private placement.

Alfredo Reyes, LRWC investor relations head, said the amount of shares covering the fund-raising will depend on the valuation that will be used out of the 1.3 billion shares.

Its shareholders approved on Friday the issuance of the said shares.

“We’re looking [to raise] around P4 billion to P5 billion. But we have not yet finalized the price,” Reyes said, adding the company is currently in talks with a number of potential investors for the fund-raising first announced last December.

LRWC’s board approved to issue up to 1.3 billion shares of the company out of its unissued shares of stocks to cover the private placement at a price based on a premium over the closing price of the shares of the company on November 29, 2018.

LRWC shares closed last November at P3.30. Its shares was last traded at P3.60.

LRWC earlier said the proceeds of the fund-raising will be used to

refinance some of the company’s existing obligations and for general corporate purposes.

In particular, the company said it will be used to refinance the P2.5billion debt the company used to finance the acquisition of its 23-hectare Boracay property, eyed to be an itegrated gaming resort in the island.

LRWC said the $550-million facility, earlier reported to being conceptualized together with Macau’s Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd., “will redefine the standards of luxury resorts in the country with the bulk of its gross floor area allocated for premium hotel rooms and other amenities like wellness centers, bars, lounges and fine-dining restaurants.” GEG is one of the world’s leading resorts, hospitality and gaming companies. It primarily develops and operates a large portfolio of integrated resort, retail, dining, hotel and gaming facilities in Macau.

In December 2017, GEG and LRWC were granted a provisional gaming license to operate Boracay Philippines Resort and Leisure Corp. VG Cabuag

PSALM to sell MTPP land in Paco, Manila

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HE Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM) has decided to sell the Manila Thermal Power Plant (MTPP) land via a negotiated scheme.

The state firm said last Friday it was seeking offers for the negotiated sale of eight lots, with a total of 20,975 square meters (sq m), as part of its efforts to generate more funds to pay off obligations incurred by the National Power Corp. (NPC).

The eight lots used to be the location of the MTPP in Paco, Manila.

The minimum offer price is set at P736.368 million. “Expressions of Interest and Acceptance of the Negotiation Procedures need to be submitted on or before January 23, 2019 to the PSALM Privati-

zation, Bids and Awards Committee,” PSALM said.

Due diligence activities have started on January 9, with the deadline for the submission of offers set on January 31 at the PSALM Office, 24th Floor Vertis North Corporate Center 1, North Avenue, Quezon City.

PSALM has real-estate assets with an aggregate land area of 100,438,788 sq m, consisting of 6,150 lots located in various parts of the country.

Around 60 percent of the total land area is located in Luzon, 39 percent in Mindanao and the remaining one percent in the Visayas.

PSALM earlier raised plans to covert some of its real-estate assets into economic zones.

Lenie Lectura

SL Agritech to slash buying price for palay, premium rice products

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OCAL hybrid-rice seed producer SL Agritech Cor p.

(SLAC) will cut its buying price for palay and retail price of its premium rice products to remain competitive against the anticipated influx of cheaper imported staple abroad once the rice tariffication law is enacted. “[Rice tariffication] will affect us by a little bit but we have to work harder and promote our rice [better],” SLAC Chairman and CEO Henry Lim Bon Liong said in a recent interview with reporters.

“Our cost of buying palay may go down as importation increases.

We will reduce our buying price and retail price depending on the supply and demand,” Lim added.

However, Lim said the company would still purchase palay at a higher price compared to the average farm-gate price of palay.

At present, SLAC pays P29 to P30 per kilogram to farmers planting their hybrid rice, Lim said.

“The farmers would not be

losing if they plant our rice. We pay them additional premium,” he said.

Lim said the changes on their buying price for palay and the retail price of their rice products would be determined during the harvest season this April to May. Lim added 95 percent of their rice products are sold locally while the remaining 5 percent are exported.

Last year, SLAC hiked the price of their premium rice products by at least 5 percent to cope with the higher production costs of palay due to more expensive fuel.

Under the rice tariffication bill, interested traders could bring in the staple provided that they comply with the requirements, such as securing a sanitary and phytosanitary import clearance, and pay the correct tariffs.

The bill also removed the regulatory powers of the National Food Authority to oversee the country’s rice imports. Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas

B2

Companies BusinessMirror

Monday, January 14, 2019

RP Energy cancels contract for coal-fired plant in Subic

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By Lenie Lectura

@llectura

EDONDO Peninsula (RP) Energy Inc., a partnership among the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco), Aboitiz Power Corp. and Taiwan Cogeneration Corp. through their respective subsidiaries, has canceled the limited notice to proceed issued to the project contractor for its 300-megawatt (MW) first phase coal-fired power plant in Subic, Zambales.

“RP Energy issued a limited notice to proceed to the EPC [engineering, procurement, construction], but we discovered we had problems with the slope, with

the site and to mitigate, to fix the site, would require the site to be stable,” AboitizPower Chief Operating Officer Emmanuel Rubio said, adding “there’s instability

in one of the slopes.”

RP Energy earlier tapped Doosan Heavy Industries and Construction Co. Ltd., and Azul Torre Construction Inc. for the coal-power project.

Later on, he said, “the board decided to hold development” and as such, “the limited notice to proceed was also canceled on the EPC” contractor.

The project proponent is now looking for solutions to address the setback.

“We are looking for alternatives, and based on the decision, we will make a decision should we actually proceed. Again, conditional to the condition of the site, it’s a construction issue, something that was not foreseen by RP Energy. We really have to find a solution on that one.

At the moment, it’s Meralco looking at a way to manage the movement,” he said.

Meralco may tap a technology

to address the problem, but given the legal issues involving the power supply agreement (PSA)—a vital component of the power project before full-blown construction takes place—Rubio said it’s best if they all wait for the court decision.

“A number of [technology], but given that the contracts are actually pending in court, I think we will make a decision once we have clarify on the decision on the contract,” he said.

In 2016 RP Energy forged a PSA with Meralco for a contracted capacity of 225 MW within a 20year term. The PSA is still pending for approval with the Energy Regulatory Commission.

The power project is classified as a committed project by the Department of Energy and is approved and registered with the Board of Investments.

AirAsia opens routes to 3 Chinese cities from Kalibo, Aklan airport

By Recto Mercene @rectomercene

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IRASIA has added several flights to Macau, Kunming and Chengdu from Kalibo International Airport, gateway to Boracay Island.

As the carrier continues to expand its international network, AirAsia Philippines CEO Captain Dexter Comendador said the airline is ringing in the new year with additional international flights to Boracay via Kalibo International Airport from three new destinations to once again boost tourism in the country’s socalled paradise island.

AirAsia’s Kalibo-Macau route will commence on March 2, 2019, with three flights weekly while KaliboChengdu will begin on January 24, 2019, operating four times weekly and Kalibo-Kunming on January 25, 2019, three times weekly.

“China is an important market for leisure and tourism and we are excited to bring them back to Boracay. Direct flights will provide ease and comfort for Chinese tourists while giving local tourism industry a necessary boost after the rehabilitation works that closed the island to all tourists for six months last year,” Comendador added.

AirAsia earlier announced it would operate Kalibo-Hangzhou

starting January 18, 2019.

The AirAsia Group has multiple routes to and from China from its hubs in Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines. AirAsia operates flights to Macau, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Guangzhou and Hangzhou from hubs in Manila, Cebu and Kalibo.

Kunming is the capital of Yunnan province in China. It is always springtime in Kunming, with pleasant weather all year long. It is known for its cultural diversity, with 25 ethnic groups and boasting natural wonders, including the magnificent limestone formations in Shilin (Stone Forest), a Unesco World Heritage site, the enchanting Jiu Xiang Cave and colorful Dongchuan Red Land.

Chengdu, meanwhile, is one of the biggest cities in China. Known for its culinary and cultural delights, this Sichuan capital has been described as the “mellower, eternally good vibes, clean and fun-loving” compared to the megacities of Beijing and Shanghai.

Macau is an autonomous region on the south coast of China located across the Pearl River Delta from Hong Kong. A Portuguese territory until 1999, Macau has been nicknamed the “Las Vegas of Asia.” One of its more striking landmarks is the 338-meter high Macau Tower.

AirAsia Philippines (AAP) is a wholly owned subsidiary of AirAsia Philippines Inc., a joint venture between Filipino investors Antonio O. Cojuangco, former Ambassador Alfredo M. Yao, Michael L. Romero, Marianne B. Hontiveros and Malaysia’s AirAsia Group Berhad.

The airline started its commercial operations in 2012 in Clark, Pampanga, and has since expanded to include hubs in Manila, Cebu, Clark and Kalibo.

AirAsia currently operates a fleet of 21 aircraft with several flights to and from Manila, Cebu, Clark, Davao, Tacloban, Puerto Princesa, Iloilo, Tagbilaran (Bohol), Kalibo, Caticlan and Cagayan de Oro. It has international flights from Manila, Cebu, Davao, Clark and Kalibo to Kuala Lumpur, Kota Kinabalu, Hong Kong, Macau, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Ho Chi Minh, Bali, Taipei, Kaohsiung, Singapore, Seoul/ Incheon, Pusan and Bangkok.

STOCK-MARKET OUTLOOK LAST WEEK

SHARE prices rose last week, with the main index closing at the 7,900-point level, as foreign buyers started to return to the market.

The benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index gained 142.98 points to close at 7,904.09 points.

The main index was up on Monday, but shed points on Tuesday as it succumbed to selling pressure.

“Despite the market’s being down, foreigners were buying heavily into our market which propelled the market to gain almost 200 points in the middle of last week.

As it came right to the brink of hitting the 8,000 key-level, the financial sector took a hit as Korean shipbuilder Hanjin Philippines filed for voluntary rehabilitation on its on $412 million worth of debt to Philippine banks,” said Christopher Mangun, head of research at Eagle Equities Inc. Foreign investors were net buyers at P4.48 billion, while average daily trading for the week was at P8.04 billion.

Most of the subindices ended on the green with the exception of the Financials index that shed 41.29 points to close at 1,772.32 points and the Mining and Oil index that lost 129.97 to 8,742.18. The broader All Shares index gained 77.56 to 4,730.15; the Industrial index rose 236.77 to 11,486.68; the Holding Firms index soared 276.53 to 7,883.57; the Property index increased 66.76 to 3,944.12; and the Services index was up 58.74 to 1,542.15.

Gainers edged losers 130 to 93 and 27 shares were unchanged.

Top gainers were Chemical Industries of the Philippines Inc., Macay Holdings Inc., Phinma Energy Corp., Lopez Holdings Corp., Metro Alliance Holdings and Equities Corp. A and Easycall Communications Philippines Inc.

THIS WEEK

SHARE prices may have some pullbacks this week as many investors would like to pocket the gains made during the previous trading sessions.

“A good breather would help reinforce the market’s recent rise, noting foreigners are starting to position anew. In the coming weeks, however, it would be prudent to visit on fundamentals, to check on the strength of listed companies’ business models,” broker 2TradeAsia said.

It recommended to continue to position on dips and opt for modest gains on rallies. Immediate support for the main index is seen at 7,700 to 7,800 and resistance at 8,000 to 8,050.

“Technical analysis indicator for the PSEi is already at the overbought level so the potential of profit-taking soon is still on the table,” Gabriel Jose F. Perez of Papa Securities Inc. said.

“A pullback scenario is more favorable for our market right now as we don’t want to see it go ‘too far, too fast.’ It also gives more investors the chance to get in at lower prices. But the fact is, positive momentum continues to pick up and is showing no signs of slowing down, especially as we approach 8,000. Whichever way it goes next week, we are still extremely bullish on this market,” Mangun said.

STOCK PICKS

BROKER Regina Capital and Development Corp. gave a sell recommendation on the stock of SM Prime Holdings Inc. after its share price extended its rally last week with indicators showing no signs of easing.

“With SMPH breaching its resistance of P39.00, the [technical analysis] is teasing the overbought region. Indicator suggests the buying pressure will soon fade out,” it said.

It gave a weekly target on the stock at P38.50.

Shares of SM Prime closed on Friday at P39 apiece.

Meanwhile, the broker gave a buy rating on the stock of Jollibee Foods Corp., but only during pullbacks.

“After reaching a new all-time high of P324.20, the buying momentum was no longer strong enough to propel the stock further. Hence, the indicators began showing some weakness,” the broker said.

It gave a price target on the stock at P314.50 per share.

Jollibee shares closed last week at P316.60 apiece. VG Cabuag

Editor: Efleda P. Campos

Singapore fintech firm to operate in Cagayan

By Elijah Felice E. Rosales @alyasjah

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SINGAPORE-BASED financial technology (fintech) firm with a daily transaction value of $200 million has secured a license from the government to operate in the Philippines.

Singaporean 6x.com, a leading firm in digital trading asset exchange, was granted a license to operate by the Cagayan Economic Zone Authority (Ceza). The license allows it to conduct fintech solutions and offer offshore virtual currency exchange services in the Cagayan economic zone.

6x.com Inter nat iona l Vice President Vanessa Koh told the BusinessMirror the firm has invested $3 million for its local operations, which currently has a strength of 10 workers.

The odds are in favor of 6x.com, as the current Ceza leadership is turning its economic zone into a fintech hub. As a top dog in trading exchange based on blockchain

MUTUAL FUNDS

technology, the firm vowed to contribute to the development of the area in the field of fintech solutions.

Koh said the government has her firm’s backing in its bid to institute an environment for digital trading in the country.

“We are happy to be granted the license to offer financial solutions and offshore virtual currency exchange services to our global customers. We are glad to have the support in the Philippines and be part of the government’s master plan to establish a clear cryptocurrency ecosystem in the country,” Koh said.

The firm, registered in Singapore as 6X Digital Asset Trading Platform, has over 1 million users in more than 100 countries, its web site said.

It operates a daily transaction volume of more than $200 million, as its platform has the capacity to support 2 million transactions per minute and can accommodate 20 million concurrent users. 6x.com is one of the top 20 digital asset exchanges worldwide.

January 11, 2019

NAV ONE YEAR THREE YEAR FIVE YEAR Y-T-D

PER SHARE RETURN* RETURN STOCK FUNDS ALFM GROWTH FUND, INC * 265.76 -12.52% 4.16% 3.89% 5.43% ATRAM ALPHA OPPORTUNITY FUND, INC.* 1.5047 -7.51% 11.12% 4.22% 5.5% ATRAM PHILIPPINE EQUITY OPPORTUNITY FUND, INC.* 4.1434 -12.9% 6.14% 2.39% 6.09% CLIMBS SHARE CAPITAL EQUITY INVESTMENT FUND CORP.* 0.9469 -7.48% N.A. N.A. 6.3% FIRST METRO CONSUMER FUND ON MSCI PHILS. IMI, INC.* 0.8791 N.A. N.A. N.A. 6.86% FIRST METRO SAVE AND LEARN EQUITY FUND,INC.* 5.62 -8.77% 3.93% 3.31% 6.76% MBG EQUITY INVESTMENT FUND, INC. * 119.37 1.74% N.A. N.A. 1.19% ONE WEALTHY NATION FUND, INC.* 0.8887 -13.44% -3.1% N.A. 6.42% PAMI EQUITY INDEX FUND, INC.* 52.5594 -10.41% 5.77% N.A. 6.54% PHILAM STRATEGIC GROWTH FUND, INC.* 546 -10.74% 4.08% 3.33% 6.01% PHILEQUITY DIVIDEND YIELD FUND, INC.* 1.3252 -8.3% 5.74% N.A. 5.48% PHILEQUITY FUND, INC.* 38.8876 -8.53% 6.55% 5.91% 5.99% PHILEQUITY MSCI PHILIPPINE INDEX FUND, INC.* **** 1.0455 N.A. N.A. N.A. 1.04% PHILEQUITY PSE INDEX FUND INC.* 5.3041 -10.24% 6.66% 5.96% 6.71% PHILIPPINE STOCK INDEX FUND CORP.* 886.04 -10.06% 6.52% 6.07% 6.71% SOLDIVO STRATEGIC GROWTH FUND, INC. * 0.9088 -9.47% 3.55% N.A. 5.55% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY PHILIPPINE EQUITY FUND, INC.* 4.3038 -9.59% 5.98% 4.24% 5.89% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY PHILIPPINE STOCK INDEX FUND, INC.* 1.0203 -10.37% 6.44% N.A. 6.67% UNITED FUND, INC.* 3.7262 -6.21% 7.65% 4.81% 6.46% EXCHANGE TRADED FUND FIRST METRO PHIL. EQUITY EXCHANGE TRADED FUND, INC.* ***118.3853 -9.76% 7.68% 7.15% 6.67% ATRAM ASIAPLUS EQUITY FUND, INC.** $0.9493 -17.53% 4.61% -0.1% 2.56% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY WORLD VOYAGER FUND, INC.* $1.1609 -10.69% N.A. N.A. 6.48% BALANCED FUNDS PRIMARILY INVESTED IN PESO SECURITIES ATRAM DYNAMIC ALLOCATION FUND, INC.* 1.7187 -10.15% 0.8% -0.21% 3.93% ATRAM PHILIPPINE BALANCED FUND, INC.* 2.2918 -8.55% 3.43% 1.81% 3.72% FIRST METRO SAVE AND LEARN BALANCED FUND INC.* 2.6613 -5.27% 1.02% -0.22% 4.68% GREPALIFE BALANCED FUND CORPORATION* 1.354 -9.11% N.A. N.A. 3.67% NCM MUTUAL FUND OF THE PHILS., INC* 1.9016 -6.61% 2.88% 2.86% 3.09% PAMI HORIZON FUND, INC.* 3.589 -10.93% 1.07% 1.73% 1.51% PHILAM FUND, INC.* 16.3044 -9.48% 1.48% 1.81% 2.46% SOLIDARITAS FUND, INC.* 2.1475 -6.3% 3.29% 3.56% 3.67% SUN LIFE OF CANADA PROSPERITY BALANCED FUND, INC.* 3.7998 -7.4% 2.89% 2.43% 3.98% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY DYNAMIC FUND, INC.* 0.9603 -7.94% 2.31% N.A. 4.24% PRIMARILY INVESTED IN FOREIGN CURRENCY SECURITIES COCOLIFE DOLLAR FUND BUILDER, INC.* $0.03542 -2.13% 0.04% 1.84% 0.65% PAMI ASIA BALANCED FUND, INC.* $0.9442 -13.07% 3.79% -0.92% 2.03% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY DOLLAR ADVANTAGE FUND, INC.* $3.4297 -7.8% 4.48% 1.35% 4.06% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY DOLLAR WELLSPRING FUND, INC.* $1.0328 -8.13% N.A. N.A. 2.7% BOND FUNDS PRIMARILY INVESTED IN PESO SECURITIES ALFM PESO BOND FUND, INC.* 343.8 1.94% 2.13% 1.95% 0.12% ATRAM CORPORATE BOND FUND, INC.* ^^ 1.8537 -2.1% -0.8% -0.44% -0.17% COCOLIFE FIXED INCOME FUND, INC.* 2.976 5.45% 5.38% 5.27% 0.2% EKKLESIA MUTUAL FUND INC.* 2.1346 1.36% 1.49% 1.69% 0.2% FIRST METRO SAVE AND LEARN FIXED INCOME FUND,INC.* 2.2147 -0.19% 0.07% 0.33% 0.26% GREPALIFE FIXED INCOME FUND CORP P 1.5758 -2.14% -0.43% -0.15% 0.76% PHILAM BOND FUND, INC.* 3.8076 -6.17% -1.59% -0.39% -2.86% PHILEQUITY PESO BOND FUND, INC.* 3.5405 1.47% 0.76% 0.81% 0.77% SOLDIVO BOND FUND, INC. * 0.8971 -2.81% -0.73% N.A. 0.52% SUN LIFE OF CANADA PROSPERITY BOND FUND, INC.* 2.787 0.34% 1% 1.08% 0.81% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY GS FUND, INC.* 1.5517 0.07% 0.59% 0.68% 0.83% PRIMARILY INVESTED IN FOREIGN CURRENCY SECURITIES ALFM DOLLAR BOND FUND, INC. * $448.92 0.62% 2.26% 3.1% 0.15% ALFM EURO BOND FUND, INC. * Є212.4 -0.74% 1% 1.54% -0.1% ATRAM TOTAL RETURN DOLLAR BOND FUND, INC.** $1.1306 -0.22% 1.06% 2.07% 0.47% FIRST METRO SAVE AND LEARN DOLLAR BOND FUND, INC.* $0.0249 -0.4% 0.82% N.A. 0% GREPALIFE DOLLAR BOND FUND CORP.* $1.6913 -4.56% -0.55% 1.16% 0.05% MAA PRIVILEGE DOLLAR FIXED INCOME FUND, INC. N.S. N.S. N.S. N.S. N.S. MAA PRIVILEGE EURO FIXED INCOME FUND, INC. ЄN.S. N.S. N.S. N.S. N.S. PAMI GLOBAL BOND FUND, INC* $1.0381 -3.05% -0.51% -2.21% 0.42% PHILAM DOLLAR BOND FUND, INC.* $2.1885 -2.72% 1% 2.88% 0.81% PHILEQUITY DOLLAR INCOME FUND INC.* $0.0570288 -0.25% 0.92% 1.85% 0.06% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY DOLLAR ABUNDANCE FUND, INC.* $2.8775 -4.47% 0.25% 1.72% 0.21% MONEY MARKET FUNDS PRIMARILY INVESTED IN PESO SECURITIES ALFM MONEY MARKET FUND, INC.* 121 2.82% 1.92% 1.59% 0.15% PHILAM MANAGED INCOME FUND, INC.* 1.1768 1.61% 0.61% 0.42% -0.4% SUN LIFE PROSPERITY MONEY MARKET FUND, INC.* 1.2203 2.71% 2.29% 1.64% 0.14% PRIMARILY INVESTED IN FOREIGN CURRENCY SECURITIES SUN LIFE PROSPERITY DOLLAR STARTER FUND, INC.* $1.0166 1.77% N.A. N.A. 0.1%

* - NAVPS AS OF THE PREVIOUS BANKING DAY ** - NAVPS AS OF TWO BANKING DAYS AGO *** - LISTED IN THE PSE.

**** - RE-CLASSIFIED INTO A BALANCED FUND STARTING JANUARY 1, 2017 (FORMERLY GREPALIFE BOND FUND CORP.).

***** - LAUNCH DATE IS NOVEMBER 6, 2017 ****** - LAUNCH DATE IS JANUARY 08, 2018 ******** - RENAMING OF THE FUND WAS APPROVED BY THE SEC LAST APRIL 13, 2018. ********* - BECAME A MEMBER SINCE APRIL 20, 2018. ******* - ADJUSTED DUE TO CASH DIVIDEND ISSUANCE LAST JANUARY 29, 2018

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Banking&Finance BusinessMirror

LandBank reports ₧15.5-B net income in 2018 as net loan portfolio grows 37%

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By Rea Cu

@ReaCuBM

HE Land Bank of the Philippines (LandBank) has reported a net income of P15.5 billion for 2018, on the back of the increases in its net loan portfolio for the year.

LandBank President and CEO Alex V. Buenaventura told financial reporters that the bank has recorded a net income of P15.5 billion for 2018, increasing by 10 percent compared to the P14.1

billion reported in 2017. “ We ac h ie ved e xce pt ion a l performance in 2018 with our net loan portfolio expanding significantly by 37 percent or more than P220 billion to reach

P840 billion,” Buenaventura said.

If not for the increases in manpower costs for the year, Buenaventura pointed out, the Bank’s net income would have been higher than P15.5 billion in line with its reported growth in loans.

“However, we incurred a significant increase in manpower cost last year because of the implementation of the salary standardization law which affected our income,” he added.

LandBank also reported that its deposit base grew by 17 percent in 2018, amounting to P1.66 trillion from P1.42 trillion in 2017, on the back of increased private sector and government deposits,

FAs, robo advisors can coexist in changing insurance landscape–Insular Life exec

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INANCIAL advising may be a lucrative career now, but advisors better adapt to emerging trends in demographics and technology if they are to remain relevant far into the future.

Insular Life Executive Chairman Nina D. Aguas outlined some of the impending threats to the financial advising industry when she spoke at the Wealth Management Center for Communications and Research (WMCCR) graduation and homecoming event at the Shangri-La Bonifacio Global City, in Taguig recently.

The WMCCR is the country’s leading center for skills development of wealth professionals such as life insurance financial advisers whose graduates are some of the country’s top premium producers.

She said competent financial advisors continue to be critical in the industry especially for high net-worth clients, who prefer to talk to humans when dealing with life insurance or investment options. However, there are trends now that could severely affect this dynamics.

“The rise of millennial in-

AGUAS

vestors is changing the dynamics of consumer-portfolio. With information easily accessible, the millennial investor’s attitude and expectations to wealth management are very different.

Millennials may opt to buy on-line given they are more tech savvy,” said Aguas.

Aguas challenged WMCCR’s alumni and new graduates to shift their ways and competencies from merely giving information, to that of an adviser who offers deep insights and value-based invest-

ments to these new breed of clients.

“Millennials demand active involvement, and prefer companies or funds that target specific or environmental outcomes,” said Aguas, citing a recent study on the subject.

Aguas also observed an ongoing rise in science- and humanbased advisory models called “Robo” advisors in the insurance industry.

“The robo-advisors’ main selling point and advantage over traditional financial advisors, is their comparatively lower fees. By providing most of the interaction online, the use of robo-advisors can save time and costs for the company. Robo advisors reduce personnel and asset costs while a higher number of customers can be served. At the same time, the low complexity of products sold online makes them easier to explain to a wide range of customers,” she said.

Aguas urged other life insurance organizations present at the event to recognize these changing trends and to adopt measures to ensure that the industry, and its financial advisors, remain relevant.

Jokowi challenger moots tax cuts to stimulate economy

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NDONESIAN presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto is proposing deep tax cuts to stimulate Southeast Asia’s largest economy, copying the playbook successfully used by US President Donald J. Trump.

Subianto and his running mate Sandiaga Uno will lower company and individual taxes by between 5 percentage points and 8 percentage points over five years and widen the tax-to-gross domestic product ratio to at least 16 percent from about 11 percent, according to Anthony Budiawan, an economist advising the pair’s campaign. Lower taxes will lead to greater compliance and allow the government to cut its borrowings to fund its budget, he said.

The economy has taken center stage in Indonesia’s presidential election campaign, with Subianto targeting incumbent Joko Widodo’s policy of adding to record government debt to finance building roads, ports and dams worth billions. The swelling of government debt and its high foreign ownership were factors in a market sell-off last year, which saw the rupiah tumble to levels not seen since the 1997-1998 Asian financial crisis.

“Our corporate tax is one of the most expensive in the region,” Rizal Ramli, a former finance minister, told reporters in Jakarta on Friday. ‘‘Lower tax rates will make Indonesia more competitive.”

Indonesia now has a top personal income tax rate of 30 percent and a corporate tax rate of 25 percent.

Subianto, who’s popularly known as Prabowo, is taking on Widodo, known as Jokowi, in a rematch of the 2014 election, which he narrowly lost to the former furniture businessman and the first non-elite to occupy the presidential office. The former general has picked Uno, a business-savvy former private equity investor, and has blamed the high public debt and slump in the currency as examples of Jokowi’s mismanagement of the economy.

If elected, Prabowo will also introduce a progressive individual tax rate, with the rich paying more to ensure a more equitable society, Budiawan said. A cut of between 5 percentage points and 8 percentage points in corporate tax can boost economic growth by as much as 0.7 percentage point a year in the short term and deliver a 1-percentage point increase in the tax-to-GDP ratio, said Harryadin Mahardika, a member of the pair’s economic team.

While Jokowi’s government has failed to increase the tax ratio despite introducing an amnesty plan while it continued to rely on revenue from commodities and debt to finance the budget, a Prabowo administration will overhaul the tax bureaucracy to make it more efficient, Mahardika said. Bloomberg News

while its capital also increased by 26 percent to P131.62 billion from P104.6 billion.

For 2019, Buenaventura remains optimistic this year will be a good year as the bank sees the lowering of interest rates from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, which will move business development.

LandBank is eyeing a P16.6billion net income for 2019.

“Very much better this year because we foresee lowering of interest rates, inflation is tempering down, and low interest rates is the prime mover of business development.

That’s the main driver of growth in 2019,” Buenaventura said.

Monday, January 14, 2019

B3

Court ruling vs RCBC executive to help in fund recovery–AMLC

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HE conviction of a former Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC) official for money laundering, in relation to the $81 million stolen funds of Bangladesh Bank, will indirectly help in the recovery of the remaining funds, the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) said.

Makati Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 149 on Thursday found guilty for money laundering former RCBC Jupiter, Makati Branch Manager Maia Deguito, and sentenced her to four to seven years of prison each for eight counts of money laundering.

In a statement, the AMLC clarified that Deguito’s conviction “is entirely separate from recovery efforts.”

However, it noted that “Deguito’s conviction only helps the retrieval indirectly by bolstering the civil forfeiture [CF] cases through which recovery efforts are coursed.”

It explained that, to date, CF cases have been filed against Eastern Leisure Hawaii Co. owner Kam Sin Wong, also known as Kim Wong, and Philrem Service Corp. owners Michael and Salud Bautista, whose

company was tapped to remit the funds to Wong’s casino.

“Both cases are pending before the Regional Trial Courts,” the AMLC said, adding that “a petition for review has also been made before the Supreme Court, contesting the lifting of the freeze order on the bank account of Bloomberry Resorts and Hotels, Inc. [Solaire Resort and Casino].”

The case started when the BB funds were stolen from its account with the Federal Reserve of New York on February 4, 2016, a crime considered one of the biggest cyber-heists in the world.

The funds were transferred to four US dollar accounts that were opened at the RCBC Jupiter branch in May 2015 under the names of Michael F. Cruz, Jessie Christopher M. Lagrosas, Alfred S. Vergara and Enrico T. Vasquez. What turned out to be bogus accounts became the main liability of Deguito as branch manager.

Part of the stolen money was laundered in casinos and was eventually traced to Wong, who later on returned a total of $4.63 million and P488 million worth of cash to the AMLC. PNA

PCSO breaches ₧60-billion target revenue–Balutan T HE Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) has announced that it surpassed the P60-billion target sales for 2018, as it continues to strengthen efforts to fight illegal gambling in the country.

Based on data provided by the Gaming, Product Development and Marketing Sector headed by Assistant General Manager Arnel N. Casas, PCSO earned P63,557,912,238.39 in 2018.

Of this amount, P31,902,529,360 came from Lotto and digit games, P26,103,422,348.39 from STL; P4 , 3 9 7, 9 6 9, 0 3 0 f r o m K e n o ; P1,149,124,000 from Instant Sweepstakes Ticket (PMC); and P4,867,500 from Sweepstakes.

“The official results are in, and I am very excited to report that STL hit P26 billion gross sales in 2018 from just P4.7 billion to P5 billion a year during the previous years. In fact, our overall gross sales is P63 billion, breaching our P60-billion target,” PCSO General Manager Alexander F. Balutan said in a statement.

“As you can see, ang laki talaga ng kinikita ng STL tapos sasabihin nila na front lang ng jueteng. Palibhasa, nawawalan na ng kita itong mga iligalista na ito. Next to Lotto and digit games, STL talaga ang nagpapasok ng kita sa

ahensya na itinutulong natin sa mga kapuspalad na nangangailangan ng tulong medical, tapos sinisiraan pa nila [We earn so much from STL and yet they say it is just a front for jueteng. It’s because these illegal gambling operators are losing profit. Next to Lotto and digit games, it is the STL that brings revenue for the agency, which we use in providing medical aid to the needy. And yet they will speak ill of it],” he added.

Executive Order 13, signed by President Duterte on February 2, 2017, seeks to “intensify” the government’s fight against illegal gambling.

The EO orders the Philippine National Police, National Bureau of Investigation, Departments of Justice, the Interior, and information and

Communications Technology to work together and intensify their efforts in curbing illegal gambling.

“I would like to acknowledge the efforts of our employees and branch managers for a job well done. Same goes to our Authorized STL agents, employees, [collectors]. You are indeed partners of the PCSO in the fight against illegal gambling,” said Balutan.

PCSO Charter, or Republic Act 1169, particularly on revenue allocation, provides that the revenue of the PCSO shall be allocated to 55 percent for prize fund (payment of prizes), 30 percent for charity fund (various charity programs and service) and 15 percent as operating fund (maintenance and operating expenses). PNA

Green Monday BusinessMirror

B4 Monday, January 14, 2019

www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Lyn Resurreccion

Climate change: Complex challenges for agriculture

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URICH, Switzerland—The unusually hot summer of 2018 showed that climate change affects a central part of our lives: agriculture. The severe drought in Liechtenstein led to large losses in the hay harvest.

In the project “Food security in rural Ethiopia” by Biovision and Caritas Vorarlberg, the villagers of Siraro district dig erosion control ditches, to preserve and enhance natural resources. Peter Lüthi/Biovision

In countries of the Global South, the consequences of climate change are already much more drastic. In Africa, for example, extreme weather conditions threaten food security for millions of people.

East Africa has encountered droughts at increasingly shorter intervals in recent years, most recently in 2005, 2006, 2009, 2011, 2014, 2015 and 2017.

Apart from drought, the conditions for agriculture are also becom i ng i nc rea si ng ly d i f f icult due to the gradual rise in temperature, salinization and changing rainy seasons.

Serious consequences include decreasing availability of food and increasing conf licts over water—both obstacles to development opportunities of the affected states and possible triggers for migration.

Agriculture is also the cause

Agr icult ur e and t he food

system are not only victims but also causes of climate change.

The term “ food system” refers to the entire food cycle, from production to harvesting, storage, distribution, consumption and disposal.

This cycle produces significant amounts of greenhouse-gas emissions. Paradoxically, modern industrial agriculture aims to intensify operations to compensate for the loss of production caused by climate change.

However, using ever more fossil fuels, synthetic fertilizers and agrochemicals increases emissions of climate-damaging gases instead of reducing them.

Indu st r i a l i zed ag r ic u lt u re

causes additional problems, as well, including large-scale deforestation, immense water consumption, soil compaction and erosion, chemical pollution of the environment and biodiversity loss.

This exacerbates the overexploitation of natural resources and increases climate change vulnerability.

Carrying on like in the past no longer an option

“Industrial agriculture has reached a dead end—there is no option to continue as before,” war ned Hans Rudolf Herren, winner of the World Food Prize and longtime president of the Biovision Foundation.

T he renow ned ag ronomist and entomologist urges global agriculture to embrace organic, multifunctional, healthy and sustainable practices that take agroecological principles into account, rather than striving for the highest possible yields.

This option is now also recognized by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization as a response to the many challenges of climate change.

Diversity increases resilience

Climate change is a complex problem involving various factors.

This calls for holistic solutions.

These include agroecology adapted to the local political, social and natural conditions.

An important principle of agroecology is the promotion of diversity. The more diverse an ecosystem is, the more flexible it can react to changes, recover from disturbances and adapt to new conditions.

Diversified agroecosystems use synergies from mixed cultivation or agroforestry systems and rely on natural fertilizers from compost and manure.

Agroecology combines traditional and new knowledge. This

Industrial agriculture has reached a dead end—there is no option to continue as before.”—Herren

includes locally adapted and robust plant varieties and animal breeds.

Efficiency-enhancing measures, such as irrigation systems, are becoming increasingly important.

At the societal level, fair-trade conditions and market access for all producers are important, as is responsible governance. The latter is necessary to coordinate and issue appropriate political policies.

Acting at all levels

A breakthrough for agroecology principles will require dialogue between all actors involved.

Only then can the course of agriculture change toward a joint sustainable future.

This is the aim of the Biovision Foundation’s advocacy team.

Together with an alliance of goaloriented organizations and states, these agroecology advocates succeeded in establishing the demand for sustainable agriculture as part of the UN’s 17 sustainability goals in New York in 2015.

The Biovision Foundation supports the achievement of these goals both for agriculture and for climate protection at three levels.

It focuses on raising public awareness for sustainable consumption and on establishing a network to implement sustainability goals.

At the international level, the advocacy team discusses agroecology with interested country representatives to position agroecology principles in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

In the project “Advocacy for Agroecology,” Biovision supports countries with concrete recommendations for action and a coordinated policy dialogue to plan climate-friendly agroecological measures.

Through various grassroots projects in Africa, Biovision has demonstrated various concrete examples of successful application of these measures. Liechtenstein Development Service’s support to train and inform smallholders is of crucial importance for farmers to have the ability to prepare themselves for the consequences of climate change. IPS

Huge ‘fatberg’ blocks English sewer L

ONDON—A British official says a giant “ fatberg” has been found blocking a sewer in southwestern England: a mass of hardened fat, oil and baby wipes measuring 64 meters (210 feet) long.

Andrew Roantree of South West Water says it will “take our sewer team around eight weeks to dissect this monster in exceptionally challenging work conditions.”

He urged the public not to pour grease down the drain or f lush baby wipes down the toilet, adding: “Don’t feed the fatberg.”

The revolting fat mass was discovered in drains in the coastal town of Sidmouth.

In 2017, a 250 -meter fatberg was found in sewers beneath W hitechapel in east London. A chunk of that later went on display at the Museum of London, nestled inside transparent boxes. AP

A part of a “fatberg” in the town of Sidmouth, England, is shown by Britain’s South West Water company on January 8. South West Water via AP

Pollution worse in 2018, thanks to factories, buildings

Black smoke rises in the sky during a nonemergency flaring operation at the ConocoPhillips refinery in the Wilmington district of Los Angeles, California. Bloomberg/Jonathan Alcorn

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n the debate over climate change, the heaviest polluters—t hink: power plants, trucks and cars—get the most attention from policy-makers. New research suggests a broader view might be called for.

A pair of often-overlooked sectors posted the largest rises in carbon dioxide pollution in the US in 2018. Emissions generated by industrial manufacturing jumped 5.7 percent, according to research firm Rhodium Group.

Commercial and residential buildings generated 10 percent more emissions.

T hose increases drove the 3.4-percent rise in overall pollution, the second-biggest yearover-year increase in the past 20 years. Transportation, which remains the US economy’s largest source of carbon dioxide, rose about 1 percent.

The increase in pollution from buildings highlights a particular problem for policy-makers. It’s strongly related to the weather—a warmer winter in 2017 suppressed demand for heating fuel and makes the return to normal in 2018 look like a spike.

And while regulators can raise efficiency standards and change building codes for new construction, there’s not much they can do to control energy use in existing homes and offices.

Manufact ur ing product ion increased last year, buoyed by a generally robust economy. But great news for factories can be a headache for carbon-cutters.

“The industrial sector is still almost entirely ignored” by climate policy-makers, the Rhodium

authors write. These “forgotten sectors,” as the Rhodium authors call them in their report, together make up about a third of US carbon dioxide, with industrial sources contributing 22 percent and buildings 11 percent in 2016, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.

The marked jump in overall US energy emissions threatens to puncture the rhetoric of both the Trump administration and the oil industry, which have celebrated dropping emissions as a sign that technological innovation and market developments can protect the environment even without strict federal regulations.

Emissions reductions—alongside record energy development— were touted at an American Petroleum Institute event in Washington this past week.

Mike Sommers, the trade group’s president, called it a “remarkable dual achievement: producing record US natural gas and oil while driving US emissions to their lowest levels in a generation.”

Pressed to reconcile his statements and the Rhodium Group data, Sommers said it’s “ important that we recognize the broader trend.”

The Rhodium report relies in part on a US Energy Information Administration (EIA) report that “projects that CO2 emissions will continue to trend downward in 2019, even as our industry continues to meet record consumer demand and deliver for American families,” he said.

A rise in US emissions in 2018 was previously forecast by the EIA in December. Bloomberg News

Saudi thirst for water is seen creating toxic brine problem

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audi Arabia isn’t just the world’s top crude oil exporter. It’s also the biggest producer of a toxic effluent that’s the by-product of slaking the desert kingdom’s thirst for water.

United Nations scientists warned this past week that desalination in Saudi Arabia and other countries is creating huge volumes of chemical-laced brine that risks contaminating food chains if left untreated.

The problem is most acute in the Middle East and North Africa, which account for twothirds of the world’s water contaminated by energy-intensive desalination plants.

“We have to address potentially severe downsides of desalination—the harm of brine and chemical pollution to the marine environment and human health,” said Vladimir Smakhtin, the director for the Hamilton, Canada-based UN Institute for Water Environment and Health.

To g e t h e r, t h e w o r l d ’s 1 6 , 0 0 0 desalination plants produce enough effluent every year to cover Florida with a foot of toxic brine, according to the peerreviewed UN study, which was published

by Elsevier Ltd.’s journal Science of the Total Environment.

Desalination is an industrial process that uses heat and pressure to make mineral-laced seawater fit for human consumption. For every liter of potable water produced, the UN estimates about

1.5 liters of liquid polluted with chlorine and copper are created.

When pumped back into the ocean, the toxic brine depletes oxygen and impacts organisms along the food chain.

Saudi Arabia’s desalination plants produce about 31.5 million cubic meters of contaminated water each day. That volume of liquid, most of which is pumped back into the ocean, is equivalent to about 20 million barrels of oil a day, or double the amount of crude it currently produces.

The Kingdom is tendering seven desalination and wastewater projects as it tries to alleviate the impacts of depleted aquifers.

While countries can treat the toxic brine to remove chemicals and heavy metals, those processes are expensive and require even more energy, according to the report.

Other countries have successfully used the brine to cultivate forage shrubs and dietary supplements, though at the cost of land salinization.

“There is a need to translate such research and convert an environmental problem into an economic opportunity,” said Manzoor Qadir, the UN institute’s assistant director. “This is particularly important in countries producing large volumes of brine with relatively low efficiencies, such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar.” Bloomberg News

Biodiversity Monday BusinessMirror

Asean Champions of Biodiversity Media Category 2014

Monday, January 14, 2019

Editor: Lyn Resurreccion • www.businessmirror.com.ph

B5

Asian indigenous peoples’ IPR on biodiversity endangered

By Michael A. Bengwayan

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ONDON—Indigenous and tribal peoples of Asia are facing complex threats to their survival as distinct peoples. Not only are they confronted with dispossession of their lands, resources and physical persecution, they are also faced with the appropriation of their collective knowledge on plants, trees, animals, insects and even land and water developed through the ages.

A book by this author, titled The Intellectual and Cultural Property Rights of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Asia, written for Minority Rights Group International (MRG) based in London, discusses these issues.

MRG, with headquarters in London, is an international human rights organization founded with the objective of working to secure the rights of ethnic, national, religious and linguistic minorities and indigenous peoples (IPs) around the world.

The book said traditional knowledge on food, crops and medicinal plants is being taken by multinational companies, while traditional songs and designs are being commercialized for tourism.

The issue of indigenous cultural property rights is becoming more urgent for IPs. Even with the United Nations’s adoption of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, there is minimum standard for their protection, the book asserted. This is because unfortunate international instruments have been adversely impacting on IPs’ cultural rights.

For instance, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and the Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights agreement put both IPs and developing nations at a disadvantage by imposing an intellectual property rights (IPR) regime that does not take into account the diversity of cultures.

Also, Article 8(j) of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, gives minimal recognition of IPs’ rights. It does not protect them from the drive by multinational companies to patent plant and animal materials—resources that are generally found in their biodiverse territories—for their potential medicinal and agricultural value, without the knowledge or consent of the peoples who have protected and nurtured them, the book covering 22 Asian countries said.

Asian IPs’ suffering “When the trees are gone, the deer are forever lost and the forests are just memories, we will weep. Not for the land that is bare and dead. But for us, our children and their children. When there are no more tears to fall, we will weep with our own blood,” said Salak Dima, an Agta IP leader, to this author deep in the Palanan wilderness in Sierra Madre Mountain Range in the Philippines, the biggest tropical rainforest in the Philippines at 200,000 hectares.

Dima symbolizes what is called “the last forest guardians.”

The Agtas are among Asia’s IPs marginalized by incoming settlers.

Indigenous and tribal peoples see themselves as distinct from the mainstream. They speak their own languages, are largely self-sufficient and their economies are tightly bound to their intimate relationship with the land.

Their culture is different from that of the mainstream, having inherited them from their forebears and adapted to their current situation.

They take only what they need from the Earth, nurturing and caring for resources as a way of life. They have often lived on their lands for thousands of years.

It is difficult to generalize about Asia’s indigenous and tribal peoples.

They encompass a huge variety of peoples living very different ways of life in a great variety of environments.

One thing they have in common is the oppression and marginalization they experience. Often, they suffer direct violence, like in Papua New Guinea, in Myanmar and in the Chittagong Hills of Bangladesh.

They also suffer from development efforts by their own governments and by multinationals through the takeover of their lands and resources.

In most parts of Asia, where IPs land rights are recognized, the government retains the power to overrule these rights in the economic interest of the state.

The intellectual and cultural property rights (ICPR) of IPs are under threat. These include their beliefs, knowledge (in agricultural, technical, medicinal, ecological movable and immovable cultural properties), the book revealed.

Struggle to protect ICPR in biodiversity The struggle of Asian IPs to protect ICPR ranges from resisting subjugation, territorial takeover, resources exploitation, destruction of traditions and infringement on customs and lifestyles, to fighting inhumane treatment, abuse and deprivation of human rights.

In Southeast Asia, much of the struggle is over land and resources, as mining, timber and oil and agricultural corporations encroach upon IPs’ lands in search for profit.

IPs are becoming victims of forced resettlement, pollution, diseases, militarization, starvation, social and cultural destruction and the ruin of traditional ways of life.

Their close connection to the land makes them particularly vulnerable to ecological damage. Extractive activities threaten their patterns of subsistence, living conditions and cultural practices.

In some cases, governments deny them civil and political rights in order to prevent them from resisting incursions.

Some states face challenges in reconciling international human-rights commitments to IPs with the requirements of foreign direct investment.

tarization, military offensives, forced labor in labor camps and educational crisis are widespread. Women face rape, marriage to military men and are trafficked by the military as slaves, laborers and prostitutes.

Efforts to fight threats on IPs’ ICPR

Against the odds, IPs have had some successes. Divide-and-rule tactics intended to break down their opposition have failed. Often, there are clear connections between resource extraction, human-rights abuses and militarization.

Governments’ roles In some countries, governments have attempted to stifle the growing resistance of their indigenous populations.

From the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia to Papua New Guinea, there is a burgeoning indigenous movement against both governments and resourcedepleting companies. This movement has brought together concerns about human rights and the environment.

It is rural-based, grassroots-initiated and multiracial. The IPs opposition remains vibrant and effective.

In Bangladesh, the struggle of the Jummas, the original inhabitants of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, is primarily with rights to land and resources. Many Jummas are losing their lands; they have been forcibly evicted by government military forces.

They are also displaced because of the discovery and development of a gas field. The gas-reserve development has affected traditional food sources like home gardens and age-old community forests, threatening the extinction of many traditional food crops.

In Nepal, the IPs are campaigning against the widespread plunder of germplasm (i.e., plant cells) and indigenous knowledge. Already, many plant resources have been lost, without recognition or recompense.

In Sri Lanka, the Wanniyala-Aetto (forest beings), are being uprooted from their forest dwellings, shot at, detained, placed in reservation areas and sold as slaves or prostitutes. Their

trees are cut, logged and traditional foodlots are razed.

The Wanniyala-Aetto women, in particular, bear the brunt of this inhuman treatment.

In the Philippines, many nongovernment organizations (NGOs) are working for IPs ICPR and, seemingly their efforts have paid off, with the passing of Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA) in 1997.

But the body set up to implement IPRA, the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, could not stop creeping mining, logging and commercial agriculture, destroying wide tracts of forests.

In Indonesia, the most significant result of IPs’ struggle for recognition of their rights is the government’s granting of decentralized power. It gave Adat-based (traditional-based) villages powers beyond the standard notions of indigenous rights in international legal discourse. This allowed the natives to take care of their forests and home gardens. But millions of hectares of IPs’ lands are being destroyed and planted with oil palm, destroying thousands of plant and animal species.

In Malaysia, encroachment into ancestral lands and intimidation are two of the many problems facing its IPs. There is no pause in the exploitation of their resources and appropriation of indigenous territories.

In Thailand, the Chao-Chaos, a mixed grouping of indigenous tribes in northern part, numbering almost a million, were granted a peoples’ Constitution, which allowed them to participate in democratic processes. They are led by the Assembly of Indigenous and Tribal peoples of Thailand (AITT).

Together with the Northern Farmers Network, AITT is pressing for the adoption of a community forest bill

to give IPs recognition of their right to their traditional resources and management practices.

In Cambodia, positive developments with regard to IPs’ struggle for land rights and the protection of their forests and natural resources is happening. Activists and NGOs headed the campaign for a new law that gave provision for land tenure for IPs. Those who now have ownership and control of their lands are enjoying their rights to their resources, such as in the tapping of resin and development of inland fisheries.

In Vietnam, however, the government is oppressive toward its indigenous population and does not allow advocacy activities. The government’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Department for Sedentary Farming announced a campaign to wipe out traditional nomadic life and swidden farming of its indigenous population.

The government is attempting to eradicate traditional shifting agriculture, the lifeline of most highland IPs, including the Banar, Ehde, Jarai, Koho and Mnong tribes, thousands of whom were imprisoned after calling for independence in February 2001.

This is causing genetic erosion of hundreds of traditional food crops, including upland rice, root crops, legumes, tubers and leafy crops.

Lao PDR has a similar policy as that of Vietnam, which aims to eradicate all traditional forms of agriculture by its IPs. As a result, hundreds of thousands of Hmong are being removed from their ancestral lands and relocated to areas not suitable for their lifestyle and cultural practices.

It is perhaps only in Myanmar, out of all the states in Asia, that the IPs form a majority. But under its military rule, political detentions, harassment, mili-

IPs view the world they live in as an integrated whole. Their beliefs, knowledge, arts and other forms of cultural expression have been handed down through generations. Their stories, songs, dances, paintings and other forms of expression are, therefore, important aspects of indigenous cultural knowledge, power and identity that form their heritage.

Heritage includes all expressions of the relationship between the people, their land and the other living beings and spirits which share the land, and is the basis for maintaining social, economic and diplomatic relationships—through sharing—with other peoples.

All of the aspects of heritage are interrelated and could not be separated from the traditional territory of the people concerned. The tangible and intangible items that constitute the heritage of a particular IP must be decided by the people themselves. The guardians of an IPs’ cultural and intellectual property are determined by the customs, laws and practices of the community. They can be individuals, a clan or the people as a whole.

Due to the active lobbying by IPs’ representatives in various international meetings, there is a growing appreciation by international agencies of the complexity of indigenous peoples discourse. The World Intellectual Property Organization has begun discussions on the issue of IPs’ ICPR, although many IPs are not entirely happy with the process.

The UN has also undertaken a study on the heritage of indigenous peoples and put forward several recommendations but these remain recommendations only. Most of the discussions at the international level on the issue remain elitist—only a very few indigenous individuals are able to participate and information regarding the discussions or outcomes are not extensively disseminated.

There is a gap between the international debate and the local realities.

Most indigenous communities are faced with life-threatening issues that keep them from actively engaging in international policy advocacy work, and yet many of the issues that indigenous peoples face on the ground are brought about by the implementation of policies crafted at the international level.

Asian IPs are now often able to wage their local struggles on a global front by working closely with international allies. A transnational movement of environmentalists, human-rights workers, lawyers and indigenous organizations is emerging to defend indigenous rights.

Sprouting mangroves restore hopes in coastal Myanmar S

HWE THAUNG YAN, Myanmar—Htay Aung is having a moment. The 63-year-old retired professor of marine science sits at the foot of a Buddha statue atop a hill on Shwe Thaung Yan subtownship, in Myanmar’s Ayyerwady region, almost in meditation. Below him, a vast thicket of mangrove glistens in the gold of a setting sun.

For Aung, this stretch of mangroves— known as the Thor Heyerdahl Climate Park—is a symbol of joy, hope and all things good.

“We gave three years of hard work in planting these trees. Now they are growing tall. Soon, they will be the biggest assets of our people,” he said, pointing at the forest and the tiny dot of houses that appear in the horizon.

Mangroves in Myanmar

This mangrove forest is spread across an area of 2,557 square kilometers (sq km)—almost the size of Luxembourg.

However, in most places, the density is wafer thin, thanks to rampant clearing of the mangroves for space to breed shrimps and for firewood, etc.

According to a recent study by Pierre Taillerdat, Massimo Lupascu and Daniel Friess, Myanmar loses about 21 sq km of its mangrove forest each year.

Shwe Thaung Yan, about 185 km northwest of Yangon, once had a severely degraded forest where 75 percent of its mangroves had been destroyed.

The story has changed.

In 2015, just before the rains came, a motley crowd of a few hundred men, women and youths from the fishing villages, wearing Shiny plastic gumboots and carrying sling sacks filled with mangrove saplings, gathered along the muddy swamp in Myagi—one of the three villages under Shwe Thaung Yan. For several hours a day, they planted the saplings in the muddy soil made fertile and nutrient rich by regular tides.

By October of that year, they had planted over 700,000 trees on 0.75 km of land.

Since then, the plantation drive has taken place each year. By the end of October 2018, the community has planted 6 million trees in three villages of under Shew Thaung Yan, covering 9 sq km of land—an area over four times bigger than the city of Monaco.

Leading the planters, besides Aung, were U Boni and Aung Aung Myint, experts in mangrove research and costal ecosystems restoration. The three are currently associated with Worldview

International Foundation (WIF)—a Norwegian charity cofounded by Arne Fjortoft, a former journalist-turned-politician and a renowned environmentalist.

“We used the satellite images, studied the images meticulously and created a map that shows the exact patches in the mangrove forest that had gone bare. We shared this information with the villagers. We also marked the areas and divided the planters in several groups and assigned each group a certain area,” Boni told Inter Press Service (IPS).

Before the plantation started, WIF entered into an active partnership with Myanmar’s Ministry of Environmental Conservation and two of the country’s leading educational institutions, Myeik and Pathein universities. The land area for planting mangroves—over a total of 7 sq km—was provided by Pathein University, which is also involved in studying marine science along the coast of Shwe Thaung Yan.

Mitigating climate change

Mangroves make up only 0.7 percent of the world’s forests, but they have the potential to store about 2.5 times as much carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) as humans produce globally each year.

A 2017 study estimated that the total amount of carbon held in the world’s mangroves was around 4.2 billion tons. If this whole amount were released as CO 2 , it would be equivalent to the annual emissions of China and the United States put together.

Another study said that Myanmar ’s mangroves—3 percent of global mangrove forests—shows “huge [blue carbon] potential if conservation can prevent further emissions from their loss and encourage future carbon sequestration through restoration.”

So, blue carbon mitigation at the national scale “is well aligned with the Paris Agreement and associated Nationally Determined Contributions for some nations,” the study said.

Cameron Keith Richards, professor at Southern Cross University, Australia, visited Thor Heyerdahl Climate Park in 2016 to evaluate the mangrove restoration and its blue carbon stock. In his validation report, which helped the project qualify for selling its carbon stocks, Richards said it was “reasonably assumed to represent an overall 4.3 million tons of CO 2 within a 20-year lifecycle of the current trees and additional trees to be planted in the project.”

Community development

Shew Thaung Yan is primarily a fishing sub township where catching and selling of fish remain the source of sustenance for its nearly 11,000-strong community.

However, the mangrove project has opened ways for alternative livelihoods and skillbuilding opportunities for the community: during the monsoon, when there is little or no fishing in the sea, the community members earn wages by planting mangrove saplings in the forests around them.

Women of the village have also started a clam-farming collective—a first for the community. The collective of 55 members is running from a site that was earlier used as a nursery for growing mangrove saplings.

The women visit the mangrove forest where they collect clams and bring it back to the farm where each of them have a 6-foot to 10-foot enclosure that are regularly flooded by the tidal waves. The clams have been “sowed” into the slushy farm soil, where they will thrive and grow fat, feeding on the nutrients brought by the tides.

This is a zero-investment livelihood initiative that promises local women a good earning

opportunity, explains Shwe Sandar Oo, the coordinator of the farming project.

“The land is free, the clams are free and we have already connected them to buyers,” she told IPS. The buyers, she said, are hoteliers in Chaung Tha, a beach town popular among domestic and foreign tourists. Big, fleshy clams are high in demand among the tourists and usually fetch half a dollar each.

Thein Thein Nwe, one of the clam farmers, said it’s the zero-investment that drew her to the collective. Earlier this year, Nwe’s eldest daughter dropped out of school at grade 10, after she failed to pass her grade 10 tests. With the income she earns from her clam farm, the 42-year-old fisherwoman now hopes to send her daughter to a private coach, so she could retake the tests.

Many in the village of Maygi have received clean cook stoves and solar lamps provided by WIF. The village has a media center where schoolgoing children of the village are learning various skills, including basic computer operations, photography and embroidery. Run by WIF, the center offers scholarship to girls who are promising but too poor to afford tuition and other school fees. IPS

B6 Monday, January 14, 2019

IT’S A ‘GREEN’ BEGINNING FOR OPPO THIS 2019 SAVE THE CHILDREN PHILIPPINES WELCOMES HIV-AIDS POLICY ACT

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AVE the Children Philippines welcomed the signing of the law that finally allows minors aged 15 and above to get tested for HIV without consent from parents or guardians.

Lawyer Albert Muyot, chief executive officer of Save the Children Philippines, said the HIV and AIDS Policy Act, or Republic Act (R A) 1116, signed

by President Duterte on December 20, 2018, amended RA 8504, or the Philippine AIDS Prevention and Control Act, which requires all minors to get a consent from parents or guardians before they can undergo an HIV test.

Muyot said the law recognizes the rights of children to health and protection from HIV. He said giving minors aged 15 years old and above access to HIV testing is consistent with the United Nations (UN) Convention on the Rights of the Child, where the government exercises responsibility to protect and assist families to nurture their children.

The new law allows minors aged 15-17 years old access to undergo voluntary HIV testing without parental consent, which was previously required under RA 8504.

Muyot welcomed provisions in the new HI V law that highlights participatory rights of children where

their v iews are respected, “when adults are making decisions that affect children.”

Section 29 of the new HIV law allows any young person aged 15 and below who is pregnant or engaged in high-risk behavior to access HIV testing and counseling with assistance from a licensed social or health worker.

When parents or guardians cannot be located or refuses to give consent, the minor aged 15 years old and below can still access HIV test and counseling through a consent from a social worker or health worker. “To protect the best interest of the child, the assent of the minor shall also be required prior to the testing,” as stated in Section 29 of RA 1116.

He said the new law is aligned with Article 5 of the UN convention that encourages parents to deal with rights issues “in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child.”

The Philippines is one of the countries with the highest number of HIV cases in the world, with an average of 32 persons getting diagnosed with HIV daily.

Latest figures from the Department of Health showed that there are 1,072 new cases of HIV in the Philippines as of October 2018, with 306 of them young people aged 15 to 24.

The percentage of youth getting infected with HIV has ballooned to 29 percent, from 13 percent over the last decade.

“The steady rise of HIV cases among minors has been a cause for alarm, since they cannot open up to their parents and guardians and get treatment due to social stigma,” Muyot said.

Save the Children Philippines, in partnership with Global Fund implements an HIV-prevention project targeting key populations of men who have sex with men, transgender women, people who inject drugs and young key populations.

The project assists in setting up community HIV centers, in addition to social-hygiene clinics in different localities that provide free access to HIV-related services. The project also employs community health workers who conduct testing among target communities and facilitate enrolment to treatment of those who test positive.

Save the Children Philippines joined the Committee on Children and HIV/ AIDS (ComCHA) being led by the Council for the Welfare of Children, in pushing for the “Proxy Consent Protocol” that allows those 18 years old and below to get HIV test through a consent from a health or social worker.

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OBILE leader Oppo is turning the year 2019 into green with the recent release of its best-selling F9 in a stunning jade-green colorway; and launching of its charity photo contest to benefit Bantay Kalikasan and the La Mesa Watershed.

Thru the F9’s new, unique gradient of white and green, Oppo is celebrating the beautiful hues of white-sand beaches, clear waters and the lush Philippine rainforests. And to take its tribute to the beauty of the Philippine islands to the next level, the mobile leader has partnered with environmental organization Bantay Kalikasan.

“Oppo is inspired to help work toward protecting and preserving the country’s natural beauty, and a partnership with Bantay Kalikasan brings us closer to that goal,” said Jane Wan, Oppo Philippines vice president for marketing.

The highlight of the partnership is the charity photo contest, which will bring together three photographers who traveled across the Philippines to capture our islands’ unique locales, cultures, stories and people. Each photographer has produced five photos on specific themes using the Oppo F9 jade green. These photos will be posted on an online gallery that voters can access via Oppo Philippines’s Facebook page starting on January 12.

The public can vote for and share their favorite photo— one photo per day—until the end of the contest on January 31.

Oppo Philippines will donate one peso for each vote and share to Bantay Kalikasan’s efforts to plant approximately three hectares of trees at the La Mesa Watershed, which is Metro Manila’s only major watershed that acts as a natural drain for heavy rains and overflowing rivers. The total number of votes and shares will be tallied at the end of the contest; make sure to use the official hashtags #OPPOCharity and #OPPOF9JadeGreen.

Furthermore, Oppo Philippines will be giving away three voter-sharers a brand-new OPPO F9 in jade green each in a raffle, after the competition duration. The photographer with

the photos that garnered the most votes and shares will be announced on Oppo Philippines’s social-media accounts.

Apart from the stunning colorways such as the all-new jade green, the Oppo F9 also boasts of a unique waterdrop screen that is sure to turn heads. This best-selling model is the perfect mobile companion for busy, on-the-go individuals with an active lifestyle—power through the entire day with the F9’s VOOC flash charging and AI battery-management features.

The Oppo F9 also comes with a 16-megapixel plus 2-megapixel dual-rear camera for dramatic portrait shots and a host of exciting picture modes, such as AR stickers, super vivid and slow motion, to enable creativity and the production of beautifully unique image content. The F9 in the new jade green colorway will retail for P17,990 (6-gigabyte RAM).

LEADING FILIPINO CHILDREN TO HEALTHIER LIVING

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PRIVATE foundation whose mandate is to help eradicate malnutrition in the country described the newly passed First 1,000 Days of Life law as timely and sustainable.

“We see the importance of initiatives to eradicate malnutrition among children. We consider the enactment of Republic Act [RA] 11148 as a comprehensive and sustainable intervention that will benefit the Filipino children’s first 1,000 days of life,” said Dindo Danao, executive director of Odyssey Foundation Inc. (OFI).

Last November 29 President Duterte signed RA 11148 into law to reduce malnutrition in the country and make Filipino children healthier. The law aims to improve the nutritional status of Filipino children and prepare them to become productive citizens.

The law, which is also known as the Kalusugan at Nutrisyon ng Mag-Nanay Act, aims to scale up the national and local health nutrition programs through a strengthened integrated strategy for maternal, neonatal, child health and nutrition in the first 1,000 days of life.

More than a decade before the passage of the law, OFI launched Gabay Nutrition supplemental feeding program to provide physical nourishment the children need to grow and become healthy and productive individuals.

Data from the government show that about 3.7

million Filipino children are stunted while 800,000 are undernourished.

Under the Gabay Nutrisyon program, OFI and community partners were able to transform undernourished children into healthy netizens. In particular, it helped 25,000 malnourished children bring their normal life back for the past several years, in more than 40 poor communities.

Early this year the foundation launched a series of trainings in cooperation with Department of Health and local government units, to let people know the importance of the first 1,000 days of life.

The trainings were participated in by barangay nutrition scholars and barangay health workers in areas that need major intervention. These nutrition and health workers, in turn, will pass the knowledge and information to health and day-care centers that will share them with mothers, pregnant women, and teenage mothers in their respective areas.

OFI President Jerome D. Ong said the foundation’s maxim “We Help Nurture Life” should be true not only to those who have financial capability to purchase CDO products, but also to those who have less in life.

“We took this maxim to the heart of OFI as the corporate social-responsibility arm of CDO Foodsphere Inc. As a CSR unit, OFI serves as a catalyst for social development that benefits the less privileged and [the] marginalized,” he said.

SECURITY BANK IS ‘THE BANKER’2018 AWARDEE FOR THE FOURTH TIME

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ECURITY Bank Corp. (SBC) has been named the country’s Bank of the Year 2018 by The Banker for its strong performance and innovation in products and services.

This is SBC’s fourth time to receive the prestigious award, known as the “Oscars of the banking industry.”

As quoted by The Banker, the international banking and finance magazine of the Financial Times Ltd., “Banks that delivered solid financial results while demonstrating prowess in developing new products, services and the employment of new technology came out on top in the Banker Awards.”

“Competition, as always, was fierce, and we received some of the strongest entries in the history of our awards,” The Banker added. “To win an award, banks need to show not only a solid set of results, but also a good performance in terms of overall strategy, new products and services, and the use of technology,” said Brian Caplen, editor of The Banker.

According to SBC President and Chief Executive Officer Alfonso L. Salcedo Jr. (in photo), “...At the center of this recognition is our valued customers. We made a BetterBanking commitment to them....”

Security Bank has mainly focused on the growth of its consumer-banking business through product innovation, which has been one of the key drivers of its solid financial results. “Our success could be attributed to our commitment

to become a better bank for our customers and to our adherence to execution excellence as we build our third business pillar [and that is] retail banking,” Salcedo added.

In line with the growing of its retail-banking business, Security Bank has produced practical solutions that customers find highly useful and valuable; this is why the bank emphasized online consumer-loan applications and deposit-account opening. It is important for Security Bank to immediately service and fulfill the needs of the younger generation customers who like to do things online.

Its salary advance (Salad) facility and business-express loan were among the products that consistently support in the growth of the bank’s portfolio. In addition, its move to include free insurance coverage to its flagship deposit account, the All Access account, was positively received by the banking public, helping to significantly increase the number of monthly account openings of new-to-bank clients.

“We do our best to cater to both older and younger generations. From renovating our Gold Circle lounge and building a discovery hub, to constantly updating and upgrading our products and services to keep up with the trends and consumer behavior, we always strive to bring the BetterBanking experience to more people,” Salcedo said.

As a result of its digital-transformation initiatives, Security Bank has seen an increase in the e-commerce transactions of its credit-card customers. The bank currently offers a roster of credit cards fit for every individual’s needs and spending habits. E-commerce transactions are protected by an extra layer of security through an OTP, or onetime password, which is sent via SMS. Security Bank was first recognized as Bank of the Year in 2012, followed by a back-to-back win in 2015 and 2016.

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HE outpouring of sadness and respect in Britain over the news of Andy Murray’s imminent retirement makes it easy to forget the emotional barrier that existed for so long between the Scottish tennis great and sports fans in his own country.

Grumpy, sulky, petulant, cold. That was the initial view toward Murray, who will end his career— sometime this year, it seems—as one of Britain’s greatest ever sportspeople as well as a champion of equality, a role model and a shining example of how to maximize talent.

It was a tearful Murray who said his battle with a

The Associated Press

By Steve Douglas

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ELBOURNE, Australia—Caroline Wozniacki is entering new territory at the Australian Open as a defending champion for the first time at a major. For Roger Federer, it’s a well-worn experience.

A women’s final last year featuring two players aiming for their first Grand Slam title finished with Wozniacki holding off top-ranked Simona Halep for the championship.

Federer beat Marin Cilic to win the Australian Open for the sixth time—claiming his 20th major crown— and successfully defend the title he won the previous year in a career comeback of sorts.

At 37, he’s still targeting records at his recordequaling 20th Australian Open: to be the first man to win seven Australian Open titles, the first man to win at least seven singles titles at two Grand Slam tournaments

(he has eight Wimbledon titles), and the first man to win five major titles after turning 30.

Of course, he’s got strong competition from Novak Djokovic, who has won the last two majors and is also aiming for a seventh Australian title. Then there’s a resurgent Rafael Nadal, the likes of Cilic and Sasha Zverev. But there’s unlikely to be another run to the final for Andy Murray, who wants to start the tournament where he has reached the final five times but is unsure how much longer he can play because of the pain in his surgically repaired right hip. He’s targeting retirement at Wimbledon, if he can go that far.

Federer, the sport’s senior statesman, was asked on Sunday how he retained such a high level of health despite being about five years older than Nadal, Djokovic and Murray—the other members of the so-called Big

Four. He said he understood his body and had a great team around him.

“Maybe also the way I play tennis, maybe it’s smoother than the other guys,” said Federer, who is renowned for a style that appears almost effortless, and his stunning, single-handed backhand. “It just maybe looks that way. I work extremely hard in the matches as well—it just maybe doesn’t come across so much.

“I don’t know if that’s also something that maybe is part of the equation.”

He said he was shocked at Murray’s announcement, at 31, of his pending retirement.

“It hits us top guys hard because we know Andy very well. We like him. He’s a good guy, Hall of Famer, legend,” Federer said. “It’s a tough one, but one down

Champions Wozniacki, Federer on different ends of spectrum

WHILE Andy Murray (from left) is widely hailed as the epitome of hard work and determination—even from his fellow tennis stars Caroline Wozniacki, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer—his work in championing equality in tennis is also highlighted. AP

It was a tearful Andy Murray who said his battle with a long-standing hip injury was making his day-today life a “struggle.” And it was tearful performance on Wimbledon’s Centre Court years ago which finally persuaded the British public to take Murray to their hearts.

the road he can look back on and be incredibly proud of everything he has achieved.”

Federer, aiming for his 100th career title, will open against No. 99-ranked Denis Istomin on Rod Laver Arena on Monday night, likely after Murray has taken on No. 22-seeded Roberto Bautista Agut on Melbourne Arena— the third of the three show courts at Melbourne Park.

Istomin had a shocking second-round win over Djokovic here in 2017 on his way to the fourth round, and Federer is wary of the Uzbek veteran after also meeting him in the first round here in 2006.

“I know what Denis did to Novak. I watched basically the entire game a couple years ago,” Federer said. “I’ve had some tough ones against him in the past. He can play well in fast courts.

“Look, I’m playing good tennis. I’m confident that I think it needs a good performance by my opponent probably to beat me. That’s always a good thought.” AP

long-standing hip injury was making his day-to-day life a “struggle.” And it was tearful performance on Wimbledon’s Centre Court years ago which finally persuaded the British public to take Murray to their hearts.

In July 2012—before he won any of his three Grand Slam titles, his two Olympic medals, or led Britain to its first Davis Cup in 79 years—an emotional Murray broke down in an on-court interview following his four-set loss to Roger Federer in the Wimbledon final.

“I felt like I was playing for the nation,” Murray said, his bottom lip quivering, “and I couldn’t quite do it.”

Inadvertently, it might have boosted his public standing more than winning the title.

ELBOURNE, Australia—Rafael Nadal knew it was inevitable that sooner or later the Big Four would become the Big Three.

That Andy Murray is the first of the longtime leading four in men’s tennis to signal the end of his career is something Nadal has to keep in perspective.

The No. 2-ranked Nadal enters the Australian Open as a legitimate title contender along with No. 1-ranked Novak Djokovic and No. 3-ranked Roger Federer, both six-time champions at Melbourne Park. Nadal is 32.

Djokovic turns 32 in May, a week or so after Murray.

Federer is 37.

Five-time finalist Murray plans to start the tournament in Australia, but he has conceded it could be his last after 20 months of struggling to overcome

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the conversation about Britain’s greatest sports star and the public was enamored.

He was honored with a knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II in 2017, the same year he rose to No. 1 in the rankings for the first time.

It was no surprise, therefore, that Murray led the news bulletins on Friday morning as Brits woke up to the news about his likely retirement, while social media was awash with praise and discussion about his impact on tennis and sports in general.

“Whatever happens next, you’ve done more than you know,” read a tweet from Wimbledon’s official account, above a picture of Murray clutching his face the moment he won the singles title at the All England Club for the first time.

While Murray was widely hailed as the epitome

a longtime injury. The severe pain from his surgically repaired right hip is restricting his movement and he has already flagged he’ll retire after Wimbledon—if he can keep playing that long.

Murray practiced on Saturday at Melbourne Park not long before Nadal appeared at a news conference to talk about his health after three months out of competitive tennis and his prospects at the Australian Open, the only one of the four Grand Slam tournaments that he hasn’t won at least twice.

“Yeah, of course is very bad news,” Nadal said of Murray’s tearful news conference the previous day. “Will be a very important loss for us, for the world of tennis, for the tour, for the fans, even for the rivals that he have been part of a great rivalry between the best players for

NADAL: MURRY’S A BIG LOSS

In an instant, Murray was humanized. His emotions laid bare, it felt like he was finally accepted by the whole country, not just tennis fans who had long appreciated his undoubted talent since turning pro in 2005.

Murray’s popularity soared and perhaps it was no coincidence that, from that turning point, he became something of a sporting phenomenon in Britain. He won Olympic gold a month later—fittingly on the same Wimbledon lawns—and his first Grand Slam title at the US Open soon after.

The following year, he became the first British man to win the Wimbledon title since Fred Perry in 1936. In 2015, he inspired Britain to the Davis Cup title. By the time he had won Wimbledon and the Olympic singles title again in 2016, he was firmly in

Grand Slam champion Serena Williams.

“That’s my boy,” his mother quickly tweeted.

That short interjection cemented Murray’s status as a role model for equality.

“I know all of us girls in the locker room are in awe and so grateful for how you always fight in our corner!” Heather Watson, Britain’s No. 2 female player, said on Friday. “You inspire me in so many ways and I don’t want you to go!!”

If his hip can hold up, there was a general desire to see Murray make it to one last Wimbledon tournament before bowing out.

Expect the tears to flow then, too.

“He’s too important to Great Britain and Wimbledon history to not have it,” former American player Andy Roddick said.

a long time, and a great competitor.

“But being honest, when somebody like him, that he achieved almost everything in his tennis career, is suffering like he’s doing for such a long time already... probably he does the right thing for his mental health.”

Nadal has missed long periods of tennis because of injuries throughout his career, still managing to amass 17 major titles, but has never contemplated a date for retirement.

“I didn’t arrive to that point. I am a positive guy. I always had the feeling that we’ll fix it,” he said. “But, of course, there is periods of time that you don’t see the light. Is tough.”

Federer has credited improvements in travel, in nutrition and in life balance for giving modern tennis players the ability to extend their careers well into their 30s. He was 35 and coming off a long injury layoff when he revived his career with an Australian Open title in 2017. He successfully

defended the title last year, his 20th major.

Nadal’s plan for longevity revolves around playing fewer tournaments and resting whenever he has persistent injuries. That became less of an option for Murray, who is contemplating further surgery just to cut down on the pain he feels when he’s doing such simple things as putting on his shoes and socks.

“Seems like he had not very long career because today players are playing that long. But he’s 31—10 years ago, if he retired at 31, we will say he had a great and very long career,” Nadal said. “We will miss him.

But today is him. Tomorrow another one. We are not 20 anymore. Our generation, everyone is more than 30s.”

The Big Four have dominated the men’s circuit for more than a decade and shared around the major titles with few exceptions, such as Stan Wawrinka’s wins at the 2014 Australian Open, the 2015 French and the 2016 US Open and Marin Cilic’s victory at the 2014 US Open. AP

| Monday, January 14, 2019 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

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of hard work and determination, his work in championing equality in tennis was also highlighted.

“Your greatest impact on the world may be yet to come,” tennis great Billie Jean King wrote on Twitter. “Your voice for equality will inspire future generations.”

Murray, who was helped on his journey by tennis-coach mother Judy, was the first leading male player to employ a female coach in Amelie Mauresmo and often spoke of wanting equal pay in tennis. In a news conference after a loss to Sam Querrey in the Wimbledon quarterfinals in 2017, Murray intervened to correct a journalist who said during his question that Querrey was the “first US player to reach a major semifinal since 2009.”

“Male player,” Murray said, in a nod to multiple

GRUMPY. SULKY. PETULANT. COLD.

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AUSSIES PSYCHED UP

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AVID GLEESON and Damien Jordan set out for the International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI) Pradera Verde Classic all psyched up and eager to cash in on their power for another crack at a Philippine Golf Tour Asia (PGTA) crown when the $100,000 event is fired off on Wednesday at the Pradera Verde Golf and Country Club.

The Australians broke the Filipinos’ stranglehold of the region’s newest circuit with contrasting victories last year with Gleeson edging Erwin Arcillas on the third extra hole to claim the Luisita Championship and Jordan sustaining a brilliant start to beat Thai Namchok Tantipokhakul by four in the Aboitiz Invitational at the Orchard.

The Filipinos, on the other hand, ruled the other five events of the PGTA’s second season held through 2018 to 2019, making the eighth stop this week in Lubao, Pampanga, a virtual clash of a local crew out to reassert its might

and a fired-up Aussie side seeking to impose their strength on a well-maintained course that puts premium on power and shotmaking.

But a slew of other foreign aces are also in the fold, firming up the elite cast that includes the title-hungry Thais, headed by Wisut Artjanawat, Pasavee Lertvilai, Poosit Supupramai and Thammanoon Sriroj along with Americans Sydney Chung, Dylan Jackson, Andy Kang and Lexus Keoninh, Englishmen Benjamin David, Joe Knox and George Twyman, Keisuke Takahashi of Japan, Korean Hwang Myung Chal, Spain’s Salvador Paya Vila and Peter Stojanovski of Macedonia, all chasing their first championship in the circuit put up by ICTSI. Gleeson and Jordan, along with a select number of pros, get to test the flat but challenging Pradera layout in tomorrow’s pro-am tournament where they will be paired with officials and guests of the event’s chief backers, including ICTSI, Custom Clubmakers,

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PHL RULES SANTI CUP

HE Philippines ended Thailand’s domination of the Santi Cup in resounding fashion, claiming the team crown via a whopping 18-stroke victory and sweeping the top two posts in individual play of the South East Asia Golf Team Championships in Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar, recently.

Indonesia Asian Games gold medal teammates Bianca Pagdanganan and Lois Kaye Go sustained their top forms and teamed up with Bernice Ilas-Olivarez to power the Philippines to the team championship in the 10th staging of the event for the top lady amateurs in the region, pooling a 72-hole total of 559.

Thailand, which ruled the first four editions from 2009 to 2012 then swept the last three championships, failed to match the Philippines’s hot start and strong finish at the City Golf Course, ending up with a 577 aggregate with Malaysia taking the bronze with a 593.

Pagdanganan, also a former Philippines Ladies Amateur Open champion, stood at the forefront of the Filipinas’ charge, scoring a 10-under 278 total to clinch the individual gold with Go bagging the silver with a 281.

Thai Napabhach Boon-in settled for bronze with 287.

Although it was only the Philippines’s second victory in a decadelong staging of the annual championship, it underscored the Filipinas’ tremendous form and confidence following their Asian Games conquest where Yuka Saso anchored the country’s improbable comeback in the final round to sweep the team and individual golds in last year’s Asiad in Jakarta.

“The victory speaks so much of our players’ character and determination. More so, it

JOGGING TO VICTORY Manny Pacquiao

DAVID GLEESON is eager to cash in on another crack at a Philippine Golf Tour Asia crown.

jogs with his team at Griffith Park in Los Angeles on Saturday as he approaches the homestretch of his preparations for his defense of the World Boxing Association welterweight title against Adrien Broner on Sunday at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. COURTESY WENDELL ALINEA/MP PROMOTIONS

RONDA ON U.C.I. ROAD CALENDAR

Azkals take on Kyrgyzstan in must-win match in Dubai

T MEMBERS of Team Philippines (from left) Bernice Ilas-Olivarez, Lois Kaye Go and Bianca Pagdanganan display their medals as they pose with team captain and National Golf Association of the Philippines Secretary-General Bones Floro.

underscored their readiness to take on the best when the country hosts the Southeast Asian Games this December,” said team captain and head of delegation Bones Floro.

The Thai boys, however, remained kings of the Putra Cup, assembling an 847 for the gold with the Philippines, made up of Aidric Chan, Carl Corpus, Kristoffer Arevalo and Miguel Castro finishing a far second at 869.

The Philippines juniors team also struggled in the Lion Cup, winding up fifth behind Myanmar (590), Thailand (592), Indonesia (598) and Singapore (598) with a 601, while the junior girls team also placed

TriAksyon set in Capiz

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Meralco, K&G Golf Apparel, BDO, Sharp, KZG, PLDT, Empire Golf and Sports, and MY Shokai Technology Inc. Jhonnel Ababa ruled the inaugural Pradera Classic last year, completing a rare back-to-back title romp in the circuit following his triumph at Eagle Ridge. But the former amateur hotshot will be hard pressed to make it two straight given the depth of the competing field.

For one, the tall, sturdy Jordan’s game could fit at Pradera, thus giving him an early edge off the mound although if the winds come into play, it could put severe options on precision, which could pave the way for a wild finish.

Meanwhile, aside from Ababa, who also won at Forest Hills last year, other Pinoys tipped to contend are leg winners Jay Bayron and James Ryan Lam, along with former PGT Order of Merit winners Tony Lascuña and Clyde Mondilla, Elmer Salvador, Jerson Balasabas, Michael Biba and Justin Quiban.

OXAS CITY in Capiz will host hundreds of triathletes from around the country in the Capiz TriAksyon leg of the 2019 National Age-Group Triathlon on April 13 and 14.

The main competition is the Standard Distance (1.5-km swim/40-km bike/10-km run) for seasoned triathletes and relay participants.

The other races are the Sprint Distance (750-meter swim/20-km bike/5-km run) also open for Junior Elite, Super TriKids or STK (6-below, 50-meter swim/300-meter bike/50-meter run), 7-8 years old (50-meter swim/500-meter bike/100meter run), 9-10 years old (100-meter swim/1km bike/150-meter run) and 11-12 years old (150-meter swim/2-km bike/150-meter run).

Participants aged 13 to 15 will engage in a Super Sprint race consisting of a 400-meter swim, 14-km bike and 3-km run race.

At stake in the event sponsored by Capiz and the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Capiz are cash prizes of P20,000, P15,000 and P10,000 for the Standard Category (overall) and Open Elite Category both for male and female.

Prizes of P12,000, P7,000 and P5,000 will also be given to the relay category winners; P12,000, P7,000 and P5,000 for the top three Sprint Male and Female; and P10,000, P8,000 and P5,000 for the podium finishers in Junior Elite Male and Female.

The top three in the Super Sprint Male and Female will be given P5,000, P3,000 and P2,000, while STK, Standard Distance and Sprint Distance age-groupers will also bag cash prizes.

Registration for the event sanctioned by the Triathlon Association of the Philippines is ongoing with entry fees set at P3,000 (Standard and Sprint Distances), P5,000 for relay, P2,000 for Super Sprint, P2,500 for Junior Elite and P1,500 for STK. Effective on January 19, the entry fees will adjust to P4,000 (Standard and Sprint), P6,000 (relay), P3,000 (Super Sprint and Junior Elite) and P2,000 for STK.

second to Thailand (590) in Kartini Cup with a 601 with Junia Gabasa grabbing the bronze in individual play with a 299.

Floro, the National Golf Association of the Philippines secretary-general, also reiterated the country’s golf body’s commitment to provide the national players, both in the men’s and women’s sides, the exposure and training needed to guarantee the Philippines’s strong showing in the upcoming SEAG wars.

“We have set several lead-up tournaments and extensive training sessions for members of the men’s and women’s teams,” Floro said.

Swim association stresses legitimacy

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HE crisis in the National Sports Association (NSA) for swimming has escalated with the Philippine Swimming Inc. (PSI) stressing its legitimacy over a group led by former champions Eric Buhain and Carlos Brosas.

The PSI said it learned about efforts by Buhain and Brosas to conduct national team tryouts for the 30th Southeast Asian Games the country is hosting in November and December.

The PSI, through a statement, insisted that no other entity could select swimmers for the national team as the group emphasized its recognition by the International Swimming Federation or Fina, the sport’s world governing body.

“It has come to our attention that a group led by Eric Buhain and Carlos Brosas have announced open tryouts for participation in the swimming competitions of the Southeast Asian Games to be held in the Philippines later this year,’’ a

memorandum issued by the PSI Board of Trustees said.

“They also claimed to have opened online registration for participation in these tryouts claiming to represent Philippine Swimming Inc.,’’ added the statement which was circulated to all PSI registered members nationwide.

Former Philippine Sports Commission Chairman Buhain, Brosas and Akiko Thompson criticized the PSI in a press conference they called late last year and stressed that reforms be implemented in the NSA. The PSI officers denounced the misrepresentation, saying Buhain and Brosas are not members of the PSI, which is also recognized by the Asian Swimming Federation.

The memorandum also explained that a new set of PSI officers and board of trustees headed by Lailani Velasco as president were properly and validly elected on February 17, 2018.

PSE Bull Run on January 20

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HE Philippine Stock Exchange Inc.’s annual running event—the PSE Bull Run—will be held on January 20 at 4 a.m. at the McKinley West in Taguig City.

The PSE Bull Run is part of the PSE’s stock market awareness campaign.

“A common aspiration at the start

of the year is to be physically fit. While we share the same goal, we also want everyone to think about their financial well-being through investing. The bull run is one way by which we introduce stockmarket investing to our kababayans,” PSE President and CEO Ramon Monzon said.

The PSE Bull Run seeks to heighten

HE Philippines engages fellow winless team Kyrgyzstan in a battle for survival for the knockout stage in the Asian Cup on Wednesday in the United Arab Emirates.

After consecutive losses to South Korea (0-1) and China (0-3), both Asian powerhouse teams, the Azkals are must-win in their 9:30 p.m. match at the Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum Stadium in Dubai against Kyrgyzstan, which also lost to China (1-2) and South Korea (0-1).

The Azkals knelt to a poised and disciplined Chinese side to remain at the bottom of Group C with an inferior goal difference to the Kyrgyz.

In dire need of a good showing in their last group assignment, the Filipinos must win by no less than two goals to advance to the round of 16.

Azkals Head Coach Sven-Goran Eriksson admitted their chances are close to nil. But he is not backing down.

“We paid a heavy price, but we are not home yet. We still have hope— but small hope, probably,” Eriksson noted.

Unlike in their match against the Koreans whom they limited to only one goal, the Filipinos struggled to play physical against the Chinese who were far more superior in almost all aspects of the game.

Shanghai SIPG’s Wu Lei scored the first goal on a looper in the 40th minute and scored another via a free kick in the 66th minute.

“We forgot about Wu Lei twice. If you do that, he will punish you, and he did with two great goals,” Eriksson said.

Substitute forward Yu Dabao made it more painful for the Azkals with a close range header 10 minutes from regulation time.

The Dragons are now in the round of 16.

Iran and Iraq advanced to the knockout stages of the Asian Cup on Saturday with a game to spare.

Three-time champion Iran, meanwhile, beat Vietnam 2-0 and secured its spot in the round of 16 when 2015 semifinalist Iraq beat Yemen 3-0 in another Group D game.

Another three-time champion,

BEST classes ongoing

GRIFFIN CLOBBERS CLIPPERS W

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HE Basketball Efficiency and Scientific Training (BEST) Center returns to three Metro Manila venues for its weekend classes.

Classes at the Ateneo covered courts fired off on January 5 and will last until February 23.

Students from Levels 1 to 4 in basketball and Levels 1 and 2 in volleyball can still join the 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. sessions. The Christ the King Seminary on E. Rodriguez Avenue in Quezon City also hosts classes from 1 to 4 p.m. on weekends for students in basketball Levels 1 and 2, according to former National Coach and BEST Center Founder Nic Jorge.

Sunday classes for basketball students in Levels 1 and 2 are also being offered at the Starmall in Alabang. Classes are from 1 to 4 p.m.

The BEST Center is a recipient of the Olympism Award from the Philippine Olympic Committee and is a Hall of Fame awardee of the Philippine Sportswriters Association. It pioneered scientific sports training in the Philippines. It has long been backed by Milo.

public awareness on the need to save for the future and to consider various investment products, including investing in companies whose shares are listed and traded in PSE. The information about the investment opportunities is readily available in the PSE web site (www.pse.com.ph) and through the PSE-sponsored disclosure system, PSE Electronic Disclosure Generation Technology, which has its own mobile application.

NBA RESULTS Detroit 109, LA Clippers 104 Miami 112, Memphis 108 Orlando 105, Boston 103 Minnesota 110, New Orleans 106 Oklahoma City 122, San Antonio 112 Phoenix 102, Denver 93 Sacramento 104, Charlotte 97 Utah 110, Chicago 102

THE Pistons’ Blake Griffin shoots over the Clippers’ Montrezl Harrell (left) and Marcin Gortat. AP

Saudi Arabia, moved closer to gaining its spot in the next round after beating Lebanon, 2-0, in Group E. With two wins each, Iran and Iraq meet in Dubai on Wednesday to decide the group winner.

Saudi Arabia meets Qatar on Thursday to close the group stage in a highly charged game amid the political tensions between the two nations.

The top two teams in each group and the four best third-placed teams advance to the round of 16.

It was a record ninth successive victory for Iran in Asian Cup group matches.

Asia’s top-ranked team has dominated possession and looked comfortable in its opening two games, scoring seven goals without conceding.

Vietnam lost a second straight match after falling to Iraq, 3-2.

Yemen and Vietnam are pointless and will fight for third place in Al Ain on Wednesday. Ramon Rafael Bonilla and AP

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OS ANGELES—Blake Griffin kept his emotions to himself in his return to Staples Center for the first time against his old team.

After scoring 44 points in the Detroit Pistons’ 109-104 victory over the Los Angeles Clippers on Saturday, he allowed himself a trip down memory lane.

“The best thing to be a part of is something that is bigger than yourself, and that is what that was,” he said in a crowded hallway outside the Pistons’ locker room. “I don’t look at what I did.”

Griffin was greeted with cheers during pregame introductions and received a standing ovation after a firstquarter video tribute from the team that drafted him first overall in 2009.

“There was a lot of hype coming into this game, and I was looking forward to it, but I’m glad that it’s over,” he said. “The next time I come it won’t be as crazy.”

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BATANG PIER’S PRINGLE NAMED SEASON SCORING CHAMP

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NEW scoring king will be crowned on January 21 when the Philippine Basketball Association Press Corps (PBAPC) holds its 25th Awards Night at the Novotel Manila Araneta Center.

Stanley Pringle of NorthPort will be honored Scoring Champion for becoming the league’s top gunner last season with an average of 21.0 points per game.

Pringle’s ascendance ended the three-year reign of former teammate Terrence Romeo, now with San Miguel Beer.

The 31-year-old Pringle, who made his national team debut also last season, leads the

Mighty bracing for tough fight

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HE LBC Ronda Pilipinas 2019 has set its sights on helping the country qualify a Filipino cyclist to the Tokyo 2020 Olympics with a five-stage race set from February 8 to 12 on Panay Island.

The race is sanctioned by the world governing Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) for the first time in its nine-year history and will feature 15 teams—seven local squads headed by reigning champion Navy-Standard Insurance and Continental Teams Go for Gold and 7 Eleven CLIQQ-Air21 by Roadbike Philippines.

LBC Ronda Executive Project Director Moe Chulani said they are supporting the country’s bid to gain qualifying points for Tokyo 2020.

“LBC Ronda Pilipinas was conceptualized to discover talents and give our local cyclists a chance to shine and earn a living. After eight editions, we at LBC Ronda Pilipinas decided to shift focus to our ultimate goal from the start, which is the Olympics,” Chulani said.

“And it’s been almost three decades since a Filipino made it to the Olympics and this is LBC Ronda Pilipinas’s way of helping the country achieve its dream of sending a Filipino cyclist back in the Olympics,” he added.

UCI is using a new qualification system for

Tokyo 2020 with the top 50 ranking by country earning berths in the Games set August next year.

The other local teams seeing action are Army Bicycology, Team Franzia, Team Tarlac and Bike Xtreme, while the international challenge will come from Matrix Powertag Japan, Nex Cycling, Korail Team Korea, PGN Road Cycling Team, Sri Lanka Navy Cycle Team, Customs Cycling Indonesia, Terengganu Cycling Team and Cambodia Cycling Team.

The Navymen will be led by former Ronda champions Ronald Oranza and Jan Paul Morales, while Go for Gold and 7Eleven CLIQQ-Air21 by Roadbike Philippines are expected to rely on their international experience to fend off the strong foreign charge.

The race opens with a 197.6-kilometer Iloilo-Iloilo Stage One on February 8 and will proceed with the 101.8-km Guimaras-Guimaras Stage Two the next day.

The cavalcade will then go back to Iloilo for the 179.4-km Iloilo-Roxas City Stage Three on February 10 followed by the 146.9-km RoxasRoxas Stage Four on February 11.

It will conclude with the 148.9-km RoxasAntique Stage Five on February 12.

The awarding ceremony will be held in Boracay on the same day.

Southeast Asia in Asian Cup RICK OLIVARES bleachersbrew@gmail.com

BLEACHERS’ BREW

WITH 44 PTS

Griffin stuck his right arm in the air and then brought his raised hands together in a thankful gesture without smiling. He clearly wanted to beat the team that stunningly traded him last January after he had signed a $171-million, five-year extension.

It showed from the start.

Griffin scored 15 points in the opening quarter when he got razzed by superfan Clipper Darrell during free-throw attempts. He had 26 points in the first half to help Detroit to a 65-54 lead.

“Hey Blake, we miss you but enough for tonight, OK?” a Clippers fan implored.

Griffin wasn’t done.

His three-pointer to start the third and a basket by Andre Drummond pushed Detroit to a 16-point lead.

Griffin had a one-hand slam reminiscent of his old Lob City days.

“He played great,” Clippers Coach Doc Rivers said.

Griffin left the court near the end of the third because of back spasms and returned briefly wearing a hot wrap.

The Clippers tied it at 97 on a three-pointer by Lou Williams after outscoring the Pistons 17-7 to open the fourth.

Reggie Bullock had two three-pointers around Drummond’s dunk and Griffin’s hook for a 107-99 lead.

“We’re really happy to get the win for Blake,” Bullock said.

The Clippers got within three and Griffin missed two three-pointers in the closing seconds.

He stepped out of bounds in the corner of the baseline while trying to save a pass and fell backward, crashing into fans and the floor.

Bruce Brown stole the ball with 20 seconds left, got fouled by Danilo Gallinari and made both to keep Detroit ahead 109-104. Gallinari’s jumper missed in the waning seconds. AP

IF you look at the ongoing Asian Cup, of the three Southeast Asian squads—Suzuki Cup champion Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines—it is only Vietnam that has a chance of advancing.

Thailand lost embarrassingly to India, 4-1, after which it took down Bahrain, 1-nil. Any chance of advancing will depend on its final preliminary match against Group A leader United Arab Emirates (UAE) and how India fares against Bahrain. A win will not be enough—it will also entail a huge scoreline to advance.

At least they put themselves in a position to advance.

Vietnam absorbed a painful 3-2 loss to Iraq when Ali Adnan scored in the 90th minute.

In their second fixture, the Vietnamese were defeated by Iran, 2-0. In their final game, they will play winless Yemen that has yet to score in the tournament. A consolation win for the Suzuki Cup champions? We will see.

The Philippines will also play a consolation match against Kyrgyzstan after losing its first two games, 1-nil to Korea, and 3-nil to China.

The last time Southeast Asian squads booked Asian Cup slots was in 2007, when they qualified because they were all co-hosts to bring Asian football’s biggest event in our region. Thailand and Vietnam both finished with 1-1-1 records, Thailand went 1-0-2 and Malaysia winless in all three games.

Before that, Thailand’s best-ever finish was third place in 1972, while Vietnam was fourth spot in 1956 and 1960.

However, those days are long gone because back then, the competition featured four to six squads only. And since the late 1980s, we’ve seen the rise of the West Asian countries. In the ongoing Asian Cup, the West Asian countries that are poised to advance to the second round are Jordan, UAE, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

That’s a lot for one region.

And it isn’t only in football, but also basketball, where they have also excelled.

It is easy to say that they have a lot of money to spend on development, but that is also not necessarily true. And mull on these truths.

Iraq and Palestine do not even play their “home” games at home. For years, they have been hampered by state-sponsored terrorism and by external enemies, such as ISIS and Al-

IGHTY Sports Coach Charles Tiu is bracing for a tough battle in next month’s Dubai International Basketball Tournament after three top teams from the Middle East confirmed their participation.

Tiu said the Mighty team to be reinforced by former LA Lakers star Lamar Odom will be contending with reigning champion Coastal Star of Tunisia, the Jordan national team and Al Riyadi of Lebanon in the 10-team tournament set from February 1 to 9.

Compounding Tiu’s woes at the moment is the team to practice with a complete lineup.

“That’s a big challenge. While the other teams have been playing together for a couple of years now we will only have at least seven practice days. I think we need a miracle this time,” said Tiu with a smile.

Team owner Alex Wongchuking echoed Tiu’s observation, saying the team, also sponsored

by Healthcube, Go For Gold and Oriental Group, is hard-pressed to match its Jones Cup sweep in Taiwan and a runner-up finish in the Merlion Cup both in 2016.

“We can’t rely on talent alone, there must be a good chemistry,” Wongchuking said.

In his Instagram account, Odom vowed to help Mighty Sports capture the championship after the team won only one game in their initial foray in the annual event two years ago.

Tiu and Wongchuking, however, refused to be swayed.

“We really don’t know his condition yet,” Tiu said. “Working out is very different from actual game.”

Beefing up Mighty Sports are Ginebra resident import Justine Brownlee, Chinese Basketball Association veteran Randolph Morris and two exciting Filipino-American players.

Qaeda. Palestine doesn’t even have a country to call its own.

Both Iraq and Palestine play for something bigger than the love for the game and that is why they excel. Laterally, we hear Catalonians say that about FC Barcelona and the way they play. There is something more that fuels them.

And although non-West Asian, India’s most popular sports are cricket and field hockey! Imagine that! Football is just growing.

Having Australia, a top world power in just about any sport, is a much-welcome addition in Asian sports. You want to test yourself against the best.

Thailand and Vietnam have very good football programs and are consistently among the Southeast Asian region’s best. Why have they struggled to qualify for Asia’s top football competition, as well? What are we missing here?

Is it a question of genetics? Attitude?

Culture? Money? Vision? The luck of the draw?

In my opinion for Philippine football, I think that we should start with the most immediate ones outside grassroots development—winning Southeast Asian Games age-group competition as well as the Suzuki Cup. Then we can set our sights on the bigger regional prizes.

We should look to emulate the discipline that Japan brings to their program, the Australians’ mania for detail, planning and order that they have down to a science. And we should also play for something in the manner that the Iraqis and Palestinians do.

I am immensely proud of how local football has progressed. We’re right there— poised to make that big leap. Three finishes in the semifinals of the Suzuki Cup—you cannot say that it is a fluke. We have to keep going at it (but with a coherent plan and not stop-gap measures). I am okay with the 1-nil loss to Korea, but before you even consider that as a landmark score—it is not—you have to repeat that performance. To say that you are over the hump, you have to do it again repeatedly. And really, Korea hasn’t played well in this tournament. They have struggled to a pair of 1-nil wins. Let’s see where they are when they play China in their final group game, and if they get going after that.

I am proud that the Philippines made the Asian Cup. Philippine football has definitely made great strides in the last 10 years. I hope we make the most out of this and continue to get better. I think it’s out there for the taking.

initial list of awardees to be feted by the men and women who regularly cover the PBA beat.

The Order of Merit and All-Interview Team will also be handed out during the special affair first held in 1993.

Recipients of the Order of Merit, given to individual who had the most number of Player of the Week awards by the PBAPC, are San Miguel Beer’s June Mar Fajardo, Magnolia Pambansang Manok’s Paul Lee and Alaska’s Vic Manuel.

This marks only the second-time multiple players will hoist the Order of Merit trophy since Arwind Santos and Jimmy Alapag in the

By Ramon Rafael Bonilla

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2008-2009 season.

Team Pilipinas and NLEX Coach Yeng Guiao leads the All-Interview Team composed of big men Christian Standhardinger and Joe Devance, along with guards Chris Ross, Mike Digregorio and Chris Tiu. The award honors players and coaches who utter juicy quotes and are always available for interviews. Except for Guiao, all five are firsttime winners of the award.

The presentation of the Virgilio “Baby” Dalupan Coach of the Year award is the event’s highlight with Leo Austria (San Miguel Beer), Chito Victolero (Magnolia) and Tim Cone

(Ginebra) vying for the trophy named after the late great coach who scored the league’s first grand slam in 1976 with the fabled Crispa Redmanizers.

The Danny Floro Executive of the Year named after the late amiable Crispa team owner, as well as the Defensive Player of the Year, All-Rookie Team, Mr. Quality Minutes, Game of the Season and Breakout Player of the Year awards will also be given out.

The PBAPC will also give out the Lifetime Achievement and President’s Awards to further highlight the silver anniversary of the event.

JUNE MAR: M.V.P. 5.0

UNE MAR FAJARDO lifted his fifth straight Most Valuable Player (MVP) trophy on Sunday, crowning himself as the most decorated, if not, the greatest Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) player of all time.

The 6-foot-10 center of the San Miguel Beermen was all smiles when he received his fifth trophy in as many years during the Leo Awards that preceded the opening ceremony along with teammate Marcio Lassiter of San Miguel and Japeth for the league’s 44th season on Sunday at the Chris Ross, Magnolia’s Aguilar of Barangay Ginebra were named in Philippine Arena.

Rome de la Rosa the First Mythical Team.

Fajardo now surpassed the four MVP and Rafi Reavis, For his all-around effort, Scottie Thompson of trophies he co-shared with Ramon Fernandez and Rain or Shine’s Barangay Ginebra was the Most Improved Player, and Alvin Patrimonio but still beat the two Gabe Norwood, Thompson then joined Mark Barroca Legends in terms of his consecutive success as who also bagged of Magnolia, Arwind Santos of San Miguel the best individual player in the league for the his third Samboy Lim Beer, Poy Erram of NLEX and Matthew season.

Sportsmanship Award.

Wright of Phoenix in the Second With averages of 20.6 points, 12.4

Fajardo, Pringle, Mythical Team. rebounds and 1.2 blocks last season, Fajardo Paul Lee of Magnolia, Phoenix’s Jason Perkins actually trailed NorthPort’s Stanley Pringle in edged former De La the statistical race, 1,107 to 1,032.

Salle teammate Jeron But the Cebuano big man, who won the Teng for the Rookie Best Player of the Conference awards in the of the Year Philippine and Commissioner’s Cups, earned honors. the nod of media, his fellow players and the Commissioner’s Office for the unprecedented accomplishment.

“I want to thank God for the blessings.

I’m lucky to be with San Miguel. I’m thankful for my teammates, coaches and the SMB management,” Fajardo said.

Fajardo accumulated 2,436 points to run away from Pringle who garnered 2,041 points.

Proving his versatility, Fajardo was also named to the All-Defensive Team JUNE MAR FAJARDO is joined by his parents, Marites and Bonifacio, as he celebrates his fifth straight Most Valuable Player award.

Sports

KUCHAR LEADS

BY TWO SHOTS

BusinessMirror

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| Monday, January 14, 2019 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

VETERANS’ JOB GONE? There are 29 players with full status on tour who are 25 or younger. That includes Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas, who already have won majors and reached No. 1 in the world.

STEWART CINK

By Doug Ferguson

RORY SABBATINI is now a naturalized citizen of Slovakia, his wife’s home. AP

Sabbatini now playing for Slovakia

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ONOLULU—Rory Sabbatini has been playing the Sony Open the last 20 years, and this one was different before he hit a shot.

Start with the flag stitched onto his golf bag.

And when he stepped to the first tee Thursday, he heard words never uttered on the Professional Golfers Association (PGA) Tour.

“From Bratislava, Slovakia, Rory Sabbatini.”

Golf fans know him as the 42-year-old South African with plenty of spunk and enough game to have won six times on the PGA Tour, who played in the Presidents Cup and once reached as high as No. 8 in the world.

That changed during a ceremony in New York last month, when Sabbatini became a naturalized citizen of Slovakia, home of his wife, Martina.

He now plays under the Slovak flag.

“Just to support her and to support our son,” Sabbatini said. “Getting Slovak citizenship is important to them, just as important as her getting her US citizenship. So I’m supporting her, and the added benefit was her cousin is the director of golf development in Slovakia, and we thought this was an opportunity.”

One benefit is the Olympics, though Sabbatini said that wasn’t his primary motive.

After a ceremony at the Consulate General of the Slovak Republic in New York, Sabbatini said he hoped playing for Slovakia would be a source of inspiration for young players in a country that has only eight other players listed in the Official World Golf Ranking, three of them amateurs.

The next Slovak behind Sabbatini is Petr Valasek at No. 1,930.

The Olympics take no more than two players from each country—a maximum of four if they are among the top 15 in the world ranking—until it reaches the 60 players. So while Sabbatini is No. 201 in the world, his Olympic ranking this week is at No. 49.

“Obviously, if things happen to fall the way they possibly could, that would be fantastic,” Sabbatini said. “But I think golf being back in the Olympics is definitely a great advantage for golf all over the world. I just truly hope that we can really get the program to develop in Slovakia, and if the Olympics would happen to boost it, that would be fantastic.”

His wife’s cousin is Rastislav Antal, the vice president of the Slovak Golf Association. He said last month at the New York ceremony that his hope was for Sabbatini to raise interest in the country so that children would get hooked on golf.

There are more golf courses in Palm Beach County, where Sabbatini lives, than Slovakia.

Among the best is Penati Golf Resort, a Jack Nicklaus design where the European Challenge Tour last staged an event in 2016. The winner was Espen Kosfstad of Norway, and his victory qualified him for the 2016 Olympics in Rio. An Olympic golfer playing under the Slovak flag seemed unlikely until Sabbatini became a citizen.

“Her cousin came up with the idea,” Sabbatini said. “This is an opportunity to bring more kids into the game of golf, because they really haven’t had an exposure on an international stage to really have someone to follow. They have a lot of hockey players, skiers, tennis players, all sports. But nobody in golf.” AP

The Associated Press

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ONOLULU—Leave it to the oldest rookie to best illustrate how the Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) Tour has become such a young man’s game.

Chris Thompson tried for 19 years to reach the highest level of golf, and he finally earned a PGA Tour card when he was 42.

With every year he spent on mini-tours from Florida to Arizona, he couldn’t help but notice that getting better only meant keeping up.

“It’s a profession that not many good players get out of, but there’s always good players getting into it,” Thompson said.

Stewart Cink knows what he’s talking about it.

Cink and Tiger Woods arrived on the PGA Tour at roughly the same time and were voted rookie of the year in consecutive seasons (1996 and 1997). Woods got an early start in the fall of 1996 and won two times in eight starts, so that became his rookie season. Cink’s first full season was 1997.

“So really, we started playing full time the same year,” he said. “For the first three years, he was the only player younger than me. That put me at 23, 24, 25. There was no younger player besides Tiger Woods than me my first three years.

“How many players on the tour now are 25 and under?” Cink asked. “Forty?”

He was close. There are 29 players with full status on tour who are 25 or younger. That includes Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas, who already have won majors and reached No. 1 in the world.

It includes Jon Rahm and Bryson DeChambeau and Xander Schauffele, all of whom are among the top 10 in the world ranking.

“They play a lot more, against better competition when they’re younger now,” Cink said. “And they’re just more seasoned when they come out here. There is no break-in period anymore like there used to be because you don’t need to learn.”

When he started two decades ago, Cink said most players—Woods is an exception in almost every way—had to reinvent the wheel and learn to play the style of golf required on the PGA Tour.

“Now you just come out here, guns blazing,” he said.

More are on the way.

Woods went straight from college to the PGA Tour. Playing on sponsor exemptions, he made enough money to secure a full card in just four

tournaments, and then he won in Las Vegas in his fifth start as a pro. It took nine years before that happened again. Ryan Moore, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and US Amateur champion, did it in 12 events in 2005, helped mightily by a runner-up finish in the Canadian Open.

Only three other players had done that since 1980, a short list that included Phil Mickelson, who won as an amateur.

Now? Spieth didn’t have a card on any tour in 2013 and effectively secured his card in six tournaments. Rahm got it done in three starts after he turned pro in 2016. What was the exception is not the norm, but it’s getting there.

Scott Verplank, who won the 1985 Western Open when he was an amateur, watched the NCAA Championship in Stillwater, Oklahoma, last spring and he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. And it wasn’t just his alma mater, Oklahoma State, winning the title. Just about every team that reached the quarterfinals of match play had players who looked like they were ready for the PGA Tour.

Charles Howell III also went to Oklahoma State and keeps tabs on college golf, “so I kind of knew what was coming.”

“All these guys were hitting the ball over 300

yards and they all putt great,” he said. “You get Justin Thomas come out and win a bunch.

Jordan Spieth comes out and wins a bunch. So when they do that, then that’s a veteran’s job gone. That’s another veteran’s job gone. That’s just how it works.”

Not entirely.

Golf doesn’t have a 53-man or 25-man roster like the National Football League or Major League Baseball. And the beauty of golf is that no other sport can be so ageless.

Remember, Mickelson won last year when he was 47 at a World Golf Championship.

Howell’s point was that it’s getting even more difficult to win as tour cards go to younger and younger players.

“When I first started on tour, the best players were the older players,” Howell said.

Woods –again, the exception—was No. 1 and on his way to four straight majors in Howell’s first full season in 2001. But the top 10 in the world was filled with players in their 30s—Mickelson and Vijay Singh, Ernie Els and Davis Love III, Colin Montgomerie and Hal Sutton.

“Now I’ve gotten older, it’s shifted the other way,” Howell said. “And the best players seem to be the younger players. So you go look now at all the guys that we talk about, that we focus on—Jordan, McIlroy, Justin Thomas, etc. These are all the young guys. And they’re the sport’s best.”

ONOLULU—Matt Kuchar made it look easy on Saturday in the Sony Open.

With no bogeys on his card, it even felt easy to him.

Beneath that cap is plenty of gray hair.

Beneath that smile, he knows better.

“Listen, the game of golf is not easy,” Kuchar said after a four-under 66 to take a two-shot lead over Andrew Putnam into the final round. “It’s not often you’re in full control. Those times you’re not in full control, you’re faced with a lot of situations where golf is going to find a way to stress you out and test you.”

He gets another test on Sunday, and Kuchar at least is equipped with recent experience. In November, he ended a fouryear drought by winning the Mayakoba Classic in Mexico on another course that requires keeping the ball in play off the tee for good chances to score.

There’s another similarity in the two events.

Kuchar had a 54-hole score of 193 in Mexico, the lowest of his career. He went one lower at the Sony Open at 18-under 192.

Kuchar has made only one bogey through 54 holes at Waialae, and he only came seriously close to one bogey until saving par from a bunker on the par-3 17th.

“Good, steady golf,” Kuchar said. “It felt easy out there. I didn’t find myself in any trouble.”

Putnam was two shots behind after a 67.

Keith Mitchell had a 63 to pull within four shots, along with Chez Reavie, who fell back with three straight bogeys early on the back nine. Those were the only players within five shots of the lead, and all of them are chasing Kuchar.

“I anticipate needing another good score tomorrow,” Kuchar said. “I know I can’t coast.”

Kuchar is 2-2 when he has the 54-hole lead going into the final round.

The only other time Kuchar won twice in the same season was in 2013, when he won the Match Play Championship in Arizona in February and the Memorial in early June. That put him at No. 4 in the world, the highest he has been in his career.

Kuchar was sliding his way out of the top 50 toward the end of last year, when he failed to make a Ryder Cup or Presidents Cup team for the first time since 2009. But he had a good session with his swing coach in Dallas, and it paid off two weeks later on the Gulf side of the Mexican coast.

This was more of the same.

Putnam, who won for the first time last year in the Barracuda Championship held opposite a World Golf Championship, did his best to stay in reach. They were tied through seven holes until Putnam made bogey on No. 8 and failed to birdie the par-5 ninth, the easiest hole at Waialae. Putnam missed an 8-foot birdie attempt on No. 18.

“Didn’t feel as easy as the first two days,” Putnam said. “Still played a good round. Still got a chance.”

Bryson DeChambeau had a 63 and led a large pack at 11-under 199, seven shots out of the lead for a slim chance at winning unless the leaders come back to the field. Also tied for fifth were Charles Howell III and 54-yearold Davis Love III, who had one of his better putting rounds.

Kuchar was at his best on a number of putts from the 50-foot range. He didn’t make any, but he didn’t leave himself any work for par. That added to the stress-free feeling of a round, and the overall control he feels in his game.

“Kuch is playing well, so I feel like I’ve got to get out there and make some birdies if it’s not too windy,” Putnam said. “If it’s like today, it’s going to be scorable. I have to stay aggressive.” AP

MATT KUCHAR: The game of golf is not easy. AP

Heart of Jesus

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EAR God, we praise the heart of Jesus, loaded down with reproaches. Becoming “propitiation for our sins” cost Jesus immensely. In this invocation we reflect on how He was loaded down with reproaches, that series of emotional tortures which He endured, especially during the terrible hours of His passion. But at this season, we rejoice because He was born and hopefully be assured of salvation which we should all merit by being in the state of grace. Amen.

GIVE US THIS DAY SHARED BY LUISA LACSON, HFL Word&Life Publications • teacherlouie1965@yahoo.com

Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com

GLENN CLOSE in Armani Privé

RAMI MALEK in Givenchy

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ALL ACCESS: LEADING LADIES SHIFT TO THE FAST LANE D3

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DARREN CRISS in Dior Homme

SANDRA OH in Atelier Versace

Monday, January 14, 2019

RICHARD MADDEN in Giorgio Armani

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BILLY PORTER in Randi Rahm Couture

Golden Globes 2019: Best-dressed best performers

LADY GAGA in Maison Valentino

TOTA PULCHRA MISS CHARLIZE

@misscharlize

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HARLIZE THERON (in Dior) was talking to the hosts of the entertainment show Access Live when Halle Berry (in Zuhair Murad) and Julia Roberts (in Stella McCartney) crashed the interview. The statuesque trio made for one unforgettable fashion frame at the red carpet of the 76th Golden Globe Awards at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California, on January 6. All I needed to see at that love fest was Nicole Kidman (in Michael Kors) and the Best-Dressed Best Actress Club would have been complete.

Kidman (nominated for the film Destroyer) eventually caught up, separately, with Theron (Tully) and Roberts (Homecoming) during the night, presented by “the only two people left in Hollywood who haven’t gotten in trouble for saying something offensive,” Sandra Oh and Adam Sandberg. (I still wish Tina Fey and Amy Poehler would host for eternity.)

“It is incumbent on all of us to protect freedom of expression. It is our story to tell, our story to write and our stand to take,” said Meher Tatna, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association president in announcing special grants of $1 million each to Inside Climate News, an organization devoted to investigative journalism on environmental issues, and to Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, a nonprofit organization that provides free legal assistance to and on behalf of journalists.

Incidentally, the Globes nominated dramatic performances based on two journalists’ lives: Rosamund Pike for A Private War, about the brave Marie Colvin, who was slain covering the Syrian Civil War; and Melissa McCarthy (in Reem Acra), magazine writer-turned-literary forger in Can You Ever Forgive Me? The Globes is a more fun, freewheeling and whimsical awards ceremony than the Oscars. It’s also where TV people get to party with movie people.

I’ve been obsessed with BBC One shows lately, so I was ecstatic when the maddeningly handsome, nextJames-Bond-most-likely Richard Madden (Bodyguard, in Giorgio Armani velvet tuxedo) and Oh (Killing Eve)

won best drama acting trophies.

Oh started the night wearing a custom-made Atelier Versace long-sleeved vibrant red gown with plunging neckline and thigh-high slit, changed to a white Atelier Versace gown with delicate Swarovski crystal embellishment and dramatic sculptural shoulder accent, and received her trophy in a custom silk cady Stella McCartney dress with gold sequin sleeves.

QUEENS/QUEERS THE British Olivia Colman (in un-queenly Stella McCartney) won Best Performance in a Motion Picture-Musical or Comedy in the lesbian period film The Favourite, while Egyptian-American Rami Malek (in custom Givenchy tuxedo) won best actor drama for Bohemian Rhapsody, the musical biopic of the bisexual Freddie Mercury of the band Queen.

Mahershala Ali (in Etro) played gay piano prodigy Don Shirley in Green Book and won a best supporting drama trophy. Filipino-American Darren Criss (in Dior Homme cherry blossom tuxedo) played murderous gay sociopath Andrew Cunanan in The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story and won Best Performance in a Miniseries or Television Film. (Also in attendance were Filipino JonJon Briones, his costar in the series, and Fil-Chinese Manny Jacinto, who stars in The Good Place on TV and soon in Top Gun: Maverick.)

Oh won for playing the queer spy Eve Polastri.

McCarthy was nominated as the lesbian Lee Israel.

Out young actor Lucas Hedges (in Giorgio Armani

velvet tuxedo) was nominated for playing a gay teen in Boy Erased. The only gay actor who won for a gay role was Ben Whishaw (in Alexander McQueen velvet jacket embroidered with crystals), Best Supporting Performance in a Series, Miniseries or Television Film Supporting Actor winner for A Very English Scandal as Norman Josiffe.

But the “queen” of the red carpet, complete with cape, was Billy Porter, nominated for drama best actor for Pose, who posted: “Tonight’s @goldenglobes lewk. #spring is coming children! Wearing custom couture by @RandiRahm, Iconic Gardenia Lapel Pins and Ballerina Ring by @oscarheyman,Shoes by @gucci.”

A STAR IS BORN THIS WAY IN 2008, the gay fandom—leading the general population—fell in love with the curiously named Lady Gaga when she performed at the Miss Universe pageant held in Vietnam. Ten years later, the “Born This Way” singer appeared in A Star is Born to great acclaim.

Gaga is the fourth woman to play the iconic role.

The first was Janet Gaynor, the very first Oscar Best Actress winner, awarded for three films (7th Heaven, Street Angel and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans) in 1927/1928. As Esther Victoria Blodgett/Vicki Lester in the first A Star is Born in 1937, Gaynor was nominated for an Oscar, but lost to Luise Rainer (The Good Earth).

Judy Garland reprised the Vicki Lester role in 1954.

She was awarded the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress-Motion Picture Comedy or Musical. She was also nominated for an Oscar, losing in an upset to

Grace Kelly (The Country Girl).

Barbra Streisand, wearing her own clothes, played Esther Hoffman in the 1976 A Star is Born. She also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress-Motion Picture Comedy or Musical over Jodie Foster (Freaky Friday), Barbara Harris (Freaky Friday and Family Plot), Goldie Hawn (The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox) and Rita Moreno (The Ritz). The film also won Best Motion Picture-Musical or Comedy. Streisand, however, was not nominated for an Oscar, which was won by Faye Dunaway (Network).

I don’t understand why the 2018 A Star is Born is under the Best Motion Picture-Drama category and Lady Gaga nominated under the Best Performance in a Motion Picture-Drama category. (Rami Malek also for Bohemian Rhapsody).

If she gets nominated for an Oscar, Gaga will oneup her nemesis Madonna. The Material Girl won a Globe for Evita in 1996, defeating Glenn Close (101 Dalmatians) and Barbra Streisand (The Mirror Has Two Faces), but was snubbed for an Oscar (won by Frances McDormand for Fargo).

At the Globes, Gaga wore a Valentino Haute Couture pervinca dress and cape made of silk faille designed for her by creative director Pierpaolo Piccioli. She also wore custom Tiffany and Co. Aurora Borealis necklace.

NOTHING COMES CLOSE THE great Glenn Close came, uhmm, close to winning the Oscar for Best Actress in 1987 for Fatal Attraction but Cher (Moonstruck) beat her, Holly Hunter (Broadcast News), Sally Kirkland (Anna) and Meryl Streep (Ironweed). She was formidable in Dangerous Liaisons but Jodie Foster (The Accused) beat her, Melanie Griffith (Working Girl), Sigourney Weaver (Gorillas in the Mist) and Meryl Streep (A Cry in the Dark) for the 1988 Best Actress Oscar. It was theater and TV in the 1990s and 2000s. In 2011, Meryl Streep (Iron Lady) beat her (Albert Nobbs) for the Best Actress Oscar.

I pray she finally wins the Oscar for The Wife. If we go by the Screen Actors Guild Award nominations, a more accurate bellwether than the Globes for the Oscars, she would be a shoo-in for an Academy nod with Lady Gaga, Olivia Colman, Emily Blunt (Mary Poppins Returns) and Melissa McCarthy.

The Wife, a film that got lukewarm reviews, is based on the book by Meg Wolitzer. As always, don’t judge a book by its movie.

Little Monsters are upset that Mother Monster Lady Gaga lost the Golden Globe to Glenn Close (in Armani Privé velvet cape dress with crystal accent).

Silly little ghels, sit down! That’s Glenn Close.

Don’t know her? GMG! Google mo, gaga! n

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Monday, January 14, 2019

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Today’s Horoscope

By Eugenia Last

CELEBRITIES BORN ON THIS DAY: Dave Grohl, 50; Jason Bateman, 50; LL Cool J, 51; Holland Taylor, 76.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Take your time, research, source out the best deal or move, and put your plans into motion with intelligence. A calculated approach to the changes you want to make this year will save you from making an unnecessary mistake. Offering suggestions and advice is one thing, but taking on responsibilities that don’t belong to you will set you back. Your lucky numbers are 3, 12, 21, 26, 32, 38, 47.

a INNISFREE Senior Vice President Global Division Chul Kim (right) with SM Investments Corp. Vice Chairman Tessie Sy-Coson and SM Retail President Ponciano Manalo at the innisfree grand launch.

THE Jeju Orchid Skincare Set is a powerful antiaging skin care formulated with the vitality of Jeju orchid for wrinkle correction, elasticity, skin tone, moisturization and pore care.

THE innisfree Green Tea Skincare Range has green tea extracts from the fields of Jeju Island, which is renowned for its cleanliness and abundant plant life. Using these products will leave skin feeling smooth, supple, and deeply hydrated.

VOLCANIC scoria is a pure, and fairly rare, ingredient formed from lava as it cools after a volcanic eruption.

The Super Volcanic Skincare Range has a powerful sebum-absorbing capacity and washes away impurities while moisturizing skin, leaving it cleaner and healthier than ever before.

Top Korean beauty brand now at SM MOA T OP Korean beauty and skin-care brand innisfree has opened its first store in the Philippines at the SM Mall of Asia.

As an innovative beauty brand and one of the fastest-growing brands in the Amorepacific group, innisfree is dedicated to sharing the clean and pure energy of nature for healthy beauty.

The brand offers innovative beauty solutions powered by the finest ingredients found on Korea’s pristine Jeju Island. Thanks to its volcanic origins, this fertile oasis has a unique ecosystem of powerful ingredients to nurture beautiful skin.

With the wonders of nature at the heart of innisfree, they take great care to preserve and protect the environment in all that they do, practicing green living and supporting causes that give back to the Earth and the community.

“In today’s culture, Filipinos are naturally drawn to Korean influences, especially the K-beauty skin-care regimen,” says Stephen Lee, general brand manager of innisfree, Amorepacific Philippines. “With our brand, we are excited to offer Pinoy consumers skin care with a quality selection of products and green sustainable practices. We are also committed to expanding and establishing a long-term presence here.”

Innisfree is unlike any other beauty brands: with its green philosophy, the brand promises to preserve and protect nature by taking the time to give back to the Earth through collective activations and campaigns.

Get that innisfree glow as Filipinos discover some of the brand’s most loved products around the world, including the Green Tea Seed Serum, Orchid Enriched Cream and Super Volcanic Pore Clay Mask. n

MILAN—To stay on trend, Italian fashion houses are refashioning themselves for future growth.

Luxury label Ermenegildo Zegna, which opened the fall and winter menswear previews at Milan Fashion Week last Friday, made its first move to expand abroad with the Zegna Group’s summer acquisition of American brand Thom Browne. The Gianni Versace house’s entrance into the group owned by American designer Michael Kors, Capri Holdings Ltd., was finalized last week.

A taste for mergers and acquisitions offers sources of cash and footholds in new markets to fashion companies that want to gain the scale for an international expansion, especially if their target is the tricky Asian market.

Charting a future path is important for Italy’s many family-run brands envisioning generational change and as various companies seek control of

distribution channels. Missoni and Cavalli recently did deals with private equity investors to get cash infusions.

While French conglomerates snapped up such powerhouse brands such as Gucci, Valentino, Fendi and Bottega Veneta, the Versace sale to an American label not quite in the luxury tier created a disorientating sense in the Italian fashion world. A recurring question came up yet again: why hasn’t a fashion group emerged in Italy.

Carlo Capasa, the head of the Italian Fashion Chamber, dismissed concerns that a world centered in Milan was in peril. “Many Italian companies don’t have Italian owners. But that doesn’t diminish their heritage or their attachment to Italy,” Capasa said. “They become much stronger. Bottega Veneta opened more stores and has increased its sales.”

The main challenge facing brands is distribution and the significant investment required to gain control of it. “Before, only a few brands controlled distribution from the beginning to the

end. Now it is common to have control over a good part of retail, which can bring more profits by taking out the middleman,” Capasa said.

“But more control requires more investments. Retail drains a lot of cash.” In the United States, he said, the decline of department stores has meant brands have had to invest in creating their own retail presence. An e-commerce launch also requires a lot of cash to get right.

Maurizio Tamagnini, the CEO of the FSI investment group that took a stake in Missoni last year, said the Italian fashion industry remains strong, representing nearly a quarter of top luxury brands and 20 percent of the fastest growing.

But despite the innovation in Italian fashion, Italy’s family-run fashion houses “have less inclination” to create a big group, Tamagnini said.

“It is easy to do, if you want to do it” by combining “the genius of our entrepreneurs with the boringness and the structure of finance,” he said.

b

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Forward motion should be what motivates you. Learn all you can, and incorporate the knowledge and information into what you are trying to do. Personal changes should be kept a secret until you have all your plans in place. HHH

c

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Live within your means, even if someone else doesn’t. Don’t feel the need to keep up or to impress anyone. Be yourself and use your intelligence to figure out how best to get what you want without going into debt. HHHH

d

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Don’t fret or get angry when you should be using your imagination to come up with good ideas.

Look at partnerships and consider how best to keep them equal. HHHH

e

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Mingle with people who have just as much or more to offer, and make plans to collaborate. Your enthusiasm will spark interest that leads to new possibilities.

Traveling, self-improvement and playful banter with someone who interests you are encouraged. HH

f

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Don’t let the little things get to you. Go out and enjoy the company of people who understand you and who know how to contribute and want to explore new projects and pastimes. Refuse to let someone manipulate or ruin your plans. HHHHH

g

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Tension will mount regarding matters concerning your home or a partnership. Try not to get annoyed. Keep the peace and take care of your responsibilities, then move on to social events, pampering and taking care of your personal needs. HH

h

Italian fashion houses get refashioned for future growth

By Colleen Barry The Associated Press

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Putting your own spin on the way you do things may not please everyone, but as long as you are happy with the results you are getting, that’s what matters. Personal gains look promising and a romantic relationship engaging. HHH

Milan fashion stalwart Giorgio Armani is from time to time identified as having the necessary liquidity to create an Italian fashion group. But the designer has said he believes that staying small allows for the flexibility necessary to adapt to market changes.

“I have always believed that economic independence is a fundamental value to work with full freedom,” Armani told the Italian financial publication MF Fashion. “For this, I have never thought of seeking investments that aren’t my own.”

While he acknowledged that the sale of iconic Italian brands to international groups “can touch our national pride,” Armani said they had to be squarely acknowledged as signs of changing times.

“I remain a supporter of independence, but what works for me doesn’t have to be universal law,” he said. “These brands have Italian spirit. If they manage to maintain that intact, then welcome to the international groups.”

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Do something different, and you’ll grab the attention of someone who will complement you and your plans. Don’t take a chance while traveling or engaging in something that could result in loss or injury. Stay focused to reach your destination. HHH

i

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): You may want change, but someone is likely to give you false information that can lead to a costly mistake. Trust in yourself, not someone trying to make money selling you something that won’t live up to its sales pitch. HHHHH

j

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Emotional matters will sprout quickly if you make an assumption or speak on someone else’s behalf.

It would be best not to get involved in other people’s affairs. HH

k

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Look at your options, and consider how best to utilize your attributes in order to bring in more cash. A professional change or handling your finances differently is encouraged and will help stabilize your standard of living. HHHH

l

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Listen carefully, take notes and do your research before you make a change that isn’t reversible. Walk away from high-pressure situations or someone who is bullying you to donate or take on more than you can handle. HHH BIRTHDAY BABY: You are proactive, energetic and motivated.

You are persuasive and ambitious.

‘take a penny’ BY PAUL COULTER The Universal Crossword/Edited by David Steinberg

ACROSS 1 The color of honey 6 Part of a litter 9 Poker variety 13 Tiny Pacific nation 14 Truth or ___ 15 Intro to physics?

16 Finishing off a French test?

19 Publicity, slangily 20 Walk in water 21 Four-letter words 22 Bloodhound’s favorite tune?

26 Houston, in rap slang 27 Mickey’s canine pal 30 Alabama march site 31 ___ to capacity 34 Landlocked Asian land 36 Architect I.M. 37 Where injured astronauts are treated?

40 Regret 41 ___ prof.

43 Cameo stone 44 Capital of Jordan

6 Chopin composition 4 48 Blender brand 49 Useless to a sommelier?

54 Kind of panel 57 Tweeter’s “Then again...”

58 Premium channel, briefly 59 Venue for the take-one-leave-one jar of this puzzle’s theme 63 Kournikova of tennis 64 Inn drinks 65 Violate a peace treaty 66 Speckled horse 67 New Deal prez 68 Narrow streets DOWN 1 Delta of Venus author Nin 2 Elbows on the table?

3 Agenda of life goals 4 Prior to, poetically 5 Bleed in the wash 6 Ivory Soap co.

7 Impulses 8 Pod legume 9 Tolkien ring bearer

0 “LOL” or “OMG” 1 11 Arizona neighbor 12 Beavers’ blockades 14 Anthropologist Fossey 17 Identical ___ 18 Don’t 23 Nancy, e.g., in Nancy 24 “___ the night before...”

25 Lecher’s look 28 Bronzeness from fieldwork 29 Mall map message 30 Mud wrap site 31 Autograph seeker 32 Aloof 33 Superman foe Luthor 35 D.C. bigwig 38 Maya Angelou, for one 39 Foolhardy 42 Makeshift cat dish 45 NYC subway inits.

47 ___ Diaries (middle-school series) 48 Emperor after Galba 50 “___ I lie?”

51 Aquatic mammal

2 Fabled fliers 5 53 Brown buildings?

54 Harry Potter’s mark 55 “Yikes!”

56 Olin of “Chocolat” 60 Bumbling sort 61 http:// address 62 Teachers’ org.

Solution to Friday’s puzzle:

Show BusinessMirror

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Monday, January 14, 2019

D3

FROM left: Heart EvangelistaEscudero, Jodi Santamaria, Angel Locsin and Anne CurtisSmith-Heussaff

CALL FOR ENTRIES TO 2019 CINEMALAYA SHORT FILM CATEGORY

ENTRIES are now being accepted for the Short Film category of the 2019 Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival and Competition.

Interested filmmakers must submit their application on or before March 1, 6 pm, to the Media Arts Division of the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP), Roxas Boulevard, Pasay City.

Entries must include: the duly completed application form; the final work in MP4 format saved on DVD (six copies) or USB, with violator, properly labeled with the title, production company address and contact numbers, production date, director’s name and running time; synopsis in English; and a brief résumé and two recent 2x2 photos of the filmmaker(s).

All entries must be submitted in a long brown envelope properly labeled with proponent’s name, title and contact details. The 10 best short features will be announced on May 14, and will compete for the Best Short Film award during the 2019 Cinemalaya Festival from August 2 to 11 at the CCP and other festival venues. The winning short film will receive a prize of P150,000 and the Balanghai trophy during the Cinemalaya Awards Night on August 11 at the CCP Tanghalang Nicanor Abelardo (CCP Main Theater).

Now on its 15th year, Cinemalaya (www.cinemalaya.org) is an all-digital film competition that aims to discover, encourage and support the cinematic works of Filipino filmmakers that boldly articulate and freely interpret the Filipino experience with fresh insight and artistic integrity.

ANDREA TORRES HEATS UP NEW YEAR WITH SEXY 2019 CALENDAR

ANOTHER year rolls in, and GMA actress Andrea Torres treats fans to a sexy 2019 calendar she personally produced in collaboration with photographer Jay Tablante.

Featuring a series of her in sultry poses, the desk calendar is one of Andrea’s ways of showing her gratitude to everyone who has supported her. “This is my way of saying thank you to my fans para mapakita ko kung gaano ako ka-grateful sa kanila sa lahat ng ginagawa nilang pagsuporta sa akin. It’s a desk calendar with 12 selected pictures for each month of the year. ’Yung mga dati ko po kasing nilabas, isang malaking poster,” she shared.

The shoot itself was a breeze for Andrea and she had a lot of fun with it. “It was easy for me kasi I worked with people na years ko nang kasama—Jay Tablante and Nikki Duque.

They’re my favorites for a reason. Open kami sa ideas ng isa’t isa. Para lang kaming nag-play shoot to be honest. It was a breeze.”

Andrea also made sure that each photo was a reflection of her personality and worked hard to achieve her enviable figure, “Gusto ko ’yung mga shots na candid lang pero pinapakita pa rin ang personality ko. Gusto ko rin ’yung wala nang iibahin, wala nang ie-edit, kasi it reminds me kung ano ’yung pinaghirapan ko.”

This 2019 fans can expect new and more exciting projects from the actress. “We always aim to surprise people with the roles that I do. As much as possible, gusto ko iba lagi ’yung roles na ginagawa ko. Dapat hindi matigil ’yung process ng pag-discover mo sa sarili mo at mga talents mo,” she said.

The calendar is now on sale at www.materica.store.com. It comes with full-color pages and a hard cover stand.

Andrea is regularly seen on the country’s longest-running and multi-awarded gag show, Bubble Gang on GMA.

Leading ladies shi�t to the fast lane ALL ACCESS RICKY GALLARDO

rickygallardoTFI@gmail.com

T

HE leading ladies of television and film are starting the new year with a bang.

After being away from prime-time television for five years, Angel Locsin is headlining a new series, titled The General’s Daughter, for ABS-CBN. It is perhaps the biggest comeback of an actress on TV and the buzz is getting louder as the pilot airing nears. Locsin had to hurdle quite a few personal obstacles over the past few years before she landed this plum role. She had to battle her weakening spine that saw her fly back and forth in Singapore to seek expert medical care.

Moreover, Locsin had to give up her longtime dream of giving life anew to the well-loved local superhero Darna, a project which was almost aborted after she was dropped from the cast.

The filmmaker tasked to bring Darna back to the big screen has also resigned citing creative and other differences with the producers.

But it is a new year and Locsin is all smiles that the Dreamscape production unit of ABS-CBN took her in and gave her this much-needed boost in her career.

Locsin is being supported by the best ensemble of actors to make sure that The General’s Daughter will be a game changer in the television landscape: Eula Valdes, Maricel Soriano, Albert Martinez, Tirso Cruz III, Paulo Avelino, Janice de Belen, JC de Vera, Arjo Atayde and Art Acuña.

The beautiful Anne Curtis is also on a roll. After a very good 2018 where we saw her do something totally different in the acclaimed action flick Buy Bust of Erik Matti, Curtis also regaled audiences with a surprise hit movie Sid and Aya. She then ended the year with Aurora for the annual all-Filipino Metro Manila Film Festival. Although the movie got mixed reviews from critics, it took home the second Best Festival Picture plum, and it gave good monetary returns to Viva Films, which bankrolled the project.

Curtis is off to a good start this year, meeting with the director of her next movie, Jason Paul Laxamana.

With a working title like Just a Stranger, the bosses at Viva are confident the film will be both a critical and commercial success when it hits the cinemas midyear.

Then there’s GMA actress Heart Evangelista who is reportedly somewhere in mainland China at the moment filming what is touted as her most important movie to date.

Talks have it that she has been cast in an important role in the sequel of the highly successful Hollywood movie Crazy Rich Asians and if the reports are true, then Evangelista certainly will be the “It Lady” of tinseltown toward the last two quarters of 2019.

We’ve always adored Evangelista ever since we met her when she was just starting out in the business.

She is pleasant, sincere, well-mannered and carries herself very well. We are certainly happy about this wonderful development in her career.

Another actress who has started to get very busy is Jodi Santamaria. If the past two years were lackluster, 2019 will certainly see her scaling new heights.

Her 2018 soap Sana Dalawa ang Puso Ko performed way below expectations especially when ABS-CBN decision makers gave it a morning time slot. But Santamaria did not lose heart.

She has started working on her solo-starrer, a film about demonic possession titled Clarita, loosely based on real life events. The movie will be directed by one of our favorite young filmmakers, Derick Cabrido.

In between being a single mother to her unico hijo Thirdy and her new film, Santamaria has also started work on her new soap Mea Culpa, also from Dreamscape.

We wish Santamaria only the best and hope that she will not commit the same mistakes she made in her personal life now that everything’s coming up roses for her. She deserves someone uncomplicated and mentally, financially, psychologically stable. And there’s a lot of them outside the entertainment business and politics that will surely treat her like a princess. n

D4 Monday, January 14, 2019

Style

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Best blushes for all skin tones AND THEN SOME DINNA CHAN VASQUEZ @dinnachanvasquez luckydinna@gmail.com

P

EOPLE always associate me with a love for lipsticks and that association is not unfounded. I own about 70 lipsticks and that is excluding those I have received as press gifts.

Aside from lipstick though, I also love blush.

I don’t have 70 blushes but I also have a lot. Aside from lipstick, blush also brightens your face. It is an instant pick-me-up.

I am not yet sure if I prefer creams or compressed powders. I just love blush, period.

My trick to making blush last is actually to start with a cream or liquid and then apply a powder over it to “seal” it. I then finish with a drop of MAC Strobe Cream.

I say I have not met a blush I didn’t like so here is a list of my favorites right now (Note: Most of these are good for any skin tone): n MAC X CAITLYN JENNER POWDER BLUSH DUO IN BUDDY. This limited-edition blush features a dark blush and a shimmery pinkish color that you are meant to swirl together in your brush. The shimmery color is beautiful on its own because it adds just a touch of brightness and shimmer without being overwhelming. n BENEFIT COSMETICS ROCKATEUR POWDER BLUSH. This is one of the most underrated blushes

I have in my stash. If you look at the pan, you’ll see a gold-ish hue but that is really just an overspray.

The blush is reddish and surprisingly intense. n BENEFIT COSMETICS GOLD RUSH POWDER BLUSH. This “golden nectar” is best for those who layer their blushes. The best way for me to use it is layer it under a matte blush for a lit-fromwithin glow. Those with darker skin tones can use Gold Rush as a highlighter. n MAC COSMETICS MINERALIZED BLUSH IN HEY, CORAL, HEY...This bright coral, which I have just purchased, is a must-have for summer. This is matte, unlike most mineralized blushes, and a little goes a long way. You don’t need a lot to make it pop. Tip: You should tap your brush out to get rid of excess powder. n GLOSSIER CLOUD PAINT IN HAZE. Almost all of my friends have this and, guess what, I finally got it, too. This deep berry works for a no-makeup makeup look. I was worried at first about how to make it work over liquid foundation so I just don’t wear it with other makeup, just with lipstick and brow products. n NARS BLUSH IN ORGASM. I have had a lovehate relationship with NARS’s bestselling blush.

Right now, it is love. This is the fifth time that I have gotten Orgasm. I hope I won’t give it away again. I’m on a glitter phase right now, so I love it again. n SUNNIES FLUFFMATE IN BAKED. This is a lipstick but I love it as a blush and even as an eyeshadow. Multiuse products are so travelfriendly, don’t you think so? The color of Baked on the cheeks is lovely, like a pale peach flush. n

Furla looks forward to spring|summer A NEW year...a new bag? If you are so inclined, check out the Furla Mimì—a new crossbody bag which provides the ground for creative experimentation, and has already distinguished itself as one of the brand’s top creations. It is part of the brand’s Spring-Summer 2019 collection, and available in two sizes: Small and Mini.

Like every Furla bag, which is exclusively distributed around these parts by Stores Specialists Inc. (www. ssilife.com.ph), Furla Mimì also strives for innovative design, functionality and convertibility. The chain link strap, which ends with a leather insert, slides with the new system of rings on the top of the bag, allowing it to be worn both as a crossbody and as a shoulder bag.

In addition, the flat pocket on the back of the Mimì provides a place to always have your essentials within reach, like your license or mobile phone, without having to open the bag.

Mimì has a grosgrain-lined interior, with a small open pocket, and comes in a range of ultra modern colors, including bright Ruby red, yellow-green Lime, light orange Mandarin, and soft pink Camellia, plus two classics—Chalk white and black Onyx.

Besides the Mimì, a new bucket bag, among others, joins the Furla family: Corona, a bag with a clean design and a drawstring handle and closure, and is distinguished by the new Furla monogram in metallic gold, imprinted on the body.

BusinessMirror

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Monday, January 14, 2019 E1

WHAT COUNTRIES AND COMPANIES CAN DO WHEN TRADE AND CYBER SECURITY OVERLAP

I

Stuart Madnick, Simon Johnson & Keman Huang

N the “Internet of Things” era, almost all products can be connected to the Internet, and most of them can also be used for spying and other malicious activities.

And since data is considered a critical asset, services, from international banking to payment systems to consumer web sites, are part of this, too.

As part of our initial research on this topic, we identified 33 cases of a country blocking the import of a product or service because of cyber security concerns. In each case, dif-

ferent circumstances and actions led to different outcomes. Countries and companies need to consider their options. We have developed a framework to systematically organize these cases, basing it on our in-depth interviews with domain experts.

What options do countries have? n Do nothing. Governments can accept the potential risk of a cyber security situation and choose to ignore it. n Develop import trade barriers.

Some nations will take actions to implement trade policies or regulations that will directly restrict the import

of international trades. n Restrict government procurement. Governments can prohibit the use and purchase of certain products. n Develop norms. Countries can agree to not engage in certain types of behavior. n Amplify the conflict. On the other hand, some nations can choose an opposite option and escalate the conflict.

What options do companies have? n Recommend action. n Acquiesce. n Compromise. Google exited the chinese market eight years ago

HOW RETAIL CHANGES WHEN ALGORITHMS CURATE EVERYTHING WE BUY

By Bobby Gibbs & Nick Harrison

T

HE first stage of the digital-shopping revolution saved consu mers t i me and money by letting them buy things they already wanted without having to go to a traditional retail store. A major part of the second stage will likely be a dramatic refinement of technologies that tailor recommendations and then scour the Internet for the best deal.

We expect that retail curators will become an industry on their own, changing the structure of the retail sector and capturing a significant share of retail sales. Below, we explore three types of digital curating engines that are emerging.

Market mappers

WE expect agnostic curating engines that will consider not just products’ price but delivery and other potential costs to suggest the best deals. Once that happens, market mappers will be able to find the best combination of items for a full online shopping trip, where the customer pays the shopping service for a variety of goods in one go.

Digital personal shoppers

A STEP beyond market mapping is to tailor offers to individual shoppers.

The key technology is learning algorithms. Pioneered by Netflix, among others, these types of algorithms get better at their predictions as the customer approves or ignores successive offers. Ultimately, digital

human-machine services could end up playing a key role that department stores currently do, curating a vast range of clothing or other consumer goods to make it easier for customers to find just what they want.

Review aggregators

AS consumers buy more types of products online, the importance of fair reviews across platforms will increase. We expect this will lead to the rise of review aggregators across platforms in a broadening range of retail segments.

Curating retail

RETAILERS are already beginning to pioneer shopping models that show these types of curating en-

gines are attractive to shoppers.

And when retail curators gain momentum, the model could scale well globally, particularly in segments where products tend to have the same specifications in all markets, such as technology and some kinds of apparel.

Once that happens, retailers, just like travel agents before them, risk becoming back-end utilities serving new intermediaries. The best way for retailers to protect themselves: Give customers good reasons to keep coming to them directly.

Bobby Gibbs is a principal in Oliver Wyman’s retail and consumer goods practice. Nick Harrison is a partner and co-lead of Oliver Wyman’s retail and consumer goods practice globally.

A checklist for planning your next big meeting

By Harvard Business Review

I

N theory, everyone understands that preparation can make or break an important meeting. The more work you do before you walk into the room, the more productive and efficient you’ll be. n Identify the purpose. Clarifying the purpose of your meeting is the first and most important planning step, and will drive all the other elements of your prep. n Make sure you need one. Don’t

pile on another meeting without thinking about other ways to accomplish your goal first. n Develop a preliminary agenda.

Decide how much time to devote to each item and what order makes sense. n Select the right participants.

Consider who can help you accomplish your goal and who will be affected by the meeting’s outcome. n Assign roles. Giving participants a specific role to play can increase focus and engagement. n Decide where and when. The

© 2019 Harvard Business School Publishing Corp. (Distributed by The New York Times Syndicate)

meeting space helps to set the tone. n Send the invitation and agenda.

Make sure attendees know the purpose of the meeting. n Send any reports or pre-reading. Also, be prepared to highlight key takeaways from the reading for those who haven’t had time to comply. n Identify the decision-making process. Choose a decision-making method ahead of time to ensure that you leave your meeting with a clear outcome. n Test any required equipment.

This step seems like a no-brainer, but

sometimes it’s hard to make time for logistical details. n Finalize the agenda. If the agenda has changed, distribute the final version to participants. n Follow up. If you’ve assigned roles, verify that attendees understand the parts they will play. n Prepare yourself. Doing the work to prepare will boost your confidence and set you up for a successful meeting.

Adapted from “Running Meetings,” fromtheHBR20-MinuteManagerSeries.

to avoid having to censure its search results to meet chinese government rules. The company has recently decided to reenter, with modest changes to its search engine operation. It is not yet clear that this compromise will be accepted by both parties. n Avoid. n Defy. An organization may challenge or attack cyber security regulations. n Collaborate. Finally, organizations can choose to work with countries to mitigate the negative impact of regulations, or even to be involved in the regulation-making process.

As the digital economy continues

to develop, cyber security will play a critical role in international trade.

Instead of considering security only a regulation issue, governments need to consider ways to avoid unnecessary confrontations, and organizations should become proactively involved to address concerns and influence policy to improve outcomes for everyone.

Stuart Madnick is a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management and the MIT School of Engineering. Simon Johnson is a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, where Keman Huang is a research scientist.

The legacy of Herb Kelleher, cofounder of Southwest Airlines

H

By Bill Taylor

ERB KELLEHER, a true business original, died last week at the age of 87. What strikes me is how much all of us can learn from what he created and how he led—that you can create vast economic value based on genuine and generous human values, why what you hope to achieve in the marketplace must be reflected in what you build in the workplace, how in an age of disruption and transformation, simplicity and consistency matter most.

Southwest’s performance since it began as a public company in 1971 is the stuff of business legend. But here’s what’s so vital for the rest of us to understand about what Herb Kelleher built—the essential piece of his legacy. To him, Southwest Airlines was never just a company. It was a cause. The goal, in his words, was to “democratize the skies”—to make it as easy, affordable and flexible for average Americans to travel as it had always been for business travelers and the affluent.

In other words, it’s not what you sell, it’s what you stand for. That’s the title of a book by Texas advertising luminary Roy Spence, one of Herb Kelleher’s closest business partners. “Business strategies change,” Spence told me. “Market positioning changes. But purpose does not change. Everybody at Southwest is a freedom fighter.”

Anyone with a passing familiarity with Herb Kelleher and Southwest knows about his fun-loving antics and the company’s high-energy culture. But what all of us can learn from him, even if we don’t share his sense of humor, is that great leaders make an explicit connection between what they are trying to achieve in the marketplace and what they are building in the workplace.

There’s one final (and overlooked) piece of Herb Kelleher’s legacy that deserves emphasis. As revolutionary a force as Southwest has been, and as large a shadow as Kelleher cast over the airline business, his company won big, and he became one of the great entrepreneurs of all time, because of a commitment to simplicity and consistency rather than nonstop innovation. In a surprising but instructive way, Southwest was wildly successful over decades because it was slow to change rather than because it was eager to change.

We’ll see if Southwest can stay true to the principles of its co-founder as it navigates the always-turbulent airlines industry. But all of us can reflect on what Herb Kelleher achieved, admire a business life well lived, and reflect on how his legacy might improve our performance as leaders.

Thanks for the ride, Herb.

Bill Taylor is a cofounder of Fast Company.

E2 Monday, January 14, 2019 • Editor: Efleda P. Campos

Education BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

PBEd calls for overhaul of teacher-education program

By Rizal Raoul S. Reyes @brownindio

F

Contributor

OR the past eight years, the quality of teachers in the country is experiencing a continuous decline as reflected in the Board Licensure Examination for Professional Teachers (BLEPT). Concerned agencies must act with a sense of urgency, Philippine Business for Education (PBEd) said.

Citing data from the Professional Regulation Commission, the

private sector-led advocacy group shared in a recent press forum a list

The Asset recognizes BDO Foundation program for PWDs

B

DO Foundation, the corporate social responsibility arm of BDO Unibank, has received another recognition for promoting the welfare of underserved members of society and empowering disadvantaged communities. Its program for persons with disabilities (PWDs) affected by Supertyphoon Yolanda was recently recognized by The Asset Corporate Awards as “A Highly Commended Initiative in Social Responsibility.”

The award, presented to BDO Unibank at an event in Hong Kong, cited the foundation for developing a community for calamitystricken PWDs and supporting their livelihood.

BDO Foundation and its partner, the Foundation for These-Abled Persons Inc. (FTI), a nonprofit organization that promotes the welfare of PWDs, built a community for Leyte-based PWDs, who were displaced and left homeless

by Yolanda. In line with its disaster-response advocacy, BDO Foundation and FTI constructed 100 typhoon-resilient resettlement homes in Santa Fe, Leyte, for the disabled people and their families.

The PWD community, touted as the first of its kind in the Philippines, was backed by the provincial government of Leyte, the Santa Fe Municipal Social Welfare Development Office

and the Institute for Social Entrepreneurship.

BDO Foundation also built a multipurpose hall in the village to support the livelihood activities of the beneficiaries. The PWDs use the structure to manufacture school furniture, which the foundation purchases for its school-building program.

The award-winning corporate citizenship initiative aims to alleviate the plight of persons with disabilities, who have lost their homes and livelihood in the wake of Supertyphoon Yolanda. The PWDs of Leyte bore the brunt of the disaster as many of them did not have immediate access to aid due to their disability.

Organized by Asset Benchmark Research, The Asset Corporate Awards recognizes outstanding achievements in corporate sustainability, social responsibility and investor relations.

The Asset award is the latest international recognition given to BDO Foundation for its program for PWDs. The foundation also received the prestigious Corporate Social Responsibility Program of the Year Gold Award from Asian Banking and Finance, and an award conferred by Enterprise Asia at the Asia Responsible Enterprise Awards for the same program.

Tesda-Aboitiz scholarship program has 74% employment success rate in 2018

T

AGUIG CITY—Around 74 percent of technical-vocational students granted certification after availing themselves of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda)-Aboitiz Scholarship Program have successfully gained employment last year.

Tesda NCR Regional Director Conrado Bares reported that out of the 100 trainees who enrolled in the program in 2018, 93 have graduated and secured NC-II certification. Of the 93, 74 percent were employed immediately.

Of the offered courses, Tesda reported a 100-percent employment rate for bartending, food and beverage services, and plumbing while 50 percent and 40 percent, respectively, for housekeeping and food processing.

“I wish that we will be able to sustain the partnership so that we will be able to reach more trainees, especially the least, the less and the lost,” he said during the turnover of P1 million worth of check from the Aboitiz Foundation in Taguig City last December 18 for the sustained implementation of the scholarship program.

The program commenced in 2016, where a memorandum of agreement was signed for a grant of P1 million to help the marginalized trainees who were enrolled in

various courses at the Tesda Women’s Center.

The grant is used to cover costs of trainees’ medical examination, assessment fees accident insurance, ID, uniform, personal protective equipment, and training supplies and materials.

Aboitiz Foundation First Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Maribeth Marasigan said the gift of education is probably the best gift that Aboitiz can give.

“With the help of Tesda and the trust that you have been giving us, these scholars are given the chance to shine their brightest and help drive change for a better world,” she said.

Marasigan also reminded the scholars to stay focused and strong, yet humble and generous: “There will be tough times…sometimes you would want to give up. But just remember the line ‘Kayang-kaya ko ito!,’ remember [that] many people are cheering for you and would really work their hardest to help you.”

The group-wide Aboitiz technical-vocational program offers an alternative solution to help highschool students who do not have the means to pursue a college education.

Since 2005, Aboitiz Foundation has assisted 2,787 trainees under this program with 2,697 graduates.

of consistently poor performing teacher education institutions (TEIs).

“The exam itself needs to be reformed. We must open it up to validity testing and item analysis, involve TEIs in test development, and revive the three-strike rule for takers,” PBEd Executive Director Love Basillote said.

With at least half of TEIs across the country performing below the national passing rate, Basillote urged for greater accountability, especially among government-funded TEIs. Moreover, the education advocacy group said the pursuit of cleansing measure includes closing down 22 TEIs consistently scoring below the 20-percent mark, of which 13 have zero overall passing rates.

PBEd also offered longer-term

solutions in teacher development.

One is selective TEI admissions for only the top 20 percent of the graduating high-school batch to enter teacher-education programs.

Another is portfolio-based training and certification, where students and teachers build their competencies and expertise through a lifelong system of credentialing, as is the case in top-performing countries like Singapore and Finland.

Meanwhile, the Department of Education (DepEd) urged TEIs to implement learner-centered approaches in developing the country’s future educators, stressing quality teachers are the bulwark of quality education.

“There will be no change in the classrooms, in education, if the teacher themselves do not know how

to use project-based learning, learner-centered activities and 21st-century skills. If you want the teachers to engage basic-education students, they must be 100-percent engaged as well,” DepEd Undersecretary for Curriculum and Instruction Lorna Dig-Dino said in a recent roundtable held in Makati City.

Dig-Dino said TEIs must discard lecture-type discussions because it does not bring positive learning results.

Fe Hidalgo, consultant of Knowledge Channel Education, called for the development of “specialist teachers” in the elementary level, especially in mathematics, science and reading.

Hidalgo also urged the DepEd, the Center for Higher Education

(CHEd), and other concerned institutions to identify the loopholes that must be addressed in the teacher-training programs.

CHEd education program specialist Ericson Reyes said it would need several years to overhaul the current teacher-education program as it has been only developed in recent years.

“When the teacher-education curriculum was drafted, the PPST was not the only standard considered.

There were other standards, which we needed to consider like the ICT [information and communications technology] competency standards.

So, maybe, the group might share with us the studies for future reference for the review of our program standards and guidelines,” Reyes said.

SM Foundation scholar-alumni give back

O

VER 1,000 alumni of the SM Foundation scholarship program flocked to the SMX Convention Center on January 6 to reunite with SM patriarch Henry Sy Sr., matriarch Felicidad T. Sy, eldest daughter Tessie Sy-Coson and youngest son Harley.

The scholars wanted to give back to them their own scholarship program to increase further the P1,000 per year that the Foundation sponsors.

After presenting Tatang and Nanang with a simple gift of gratitude, the six founders of the “Scholars for Scholars” movement headed by Loida Ongteco-de Vera, now operations manager of SM Hypermarket; Ellyson C. Bala, SAVP, IT Department, SM Prime Holdings; Novelyn B. Donoso, finance analyst, San Miguel Food Inc.; Emylou M. Cadalzo, RS department manager, NKC manufacturing Philippines Corp.; Jeffrey C. Manhulad and Junnair B. Manla, network engineer, NTT Singapore Pte. Ltd. presented Debbie P. Sy, executive director of SM Foundation, with a seed money of P100,000 they raised among themselves, vowing to increase this further in

time for enrollment in July.

The five founders of the “Scholars for Scholars” movement of the more stable alumni of SM Foundation also distributed voluntary pledge forms during the program.

Also present at the gathering were Jose Sio, president of SM Foundation; Linda Atayde, executive director for Education and Trustees of the Board; Dr. Lydia Echauz and Chito Macapagal. SM executives led by SMIC’s Paul Arcenas.

Ronald Tumao also came to lend support to the activity.

Wearing blue jackets gifted them by the foundation as remembrance, the former scholars rendered song and dance numbers and heartwarming testimonials from Ericson Cabrera, 2010 graduate; Junnair Manla, 2014 graduate of NU now based in Singapore; Novelyn Beboso, 2005 graduate; and Ellyson Bala, FEU graduate of 1999. Their stories drew tears of joy among the listeners.

An alumna, Gemma Gutierrez composed an original “thank you” song, which she sang.

She prodded her peers to sing along with her.

The scholars came from all over the Philippines, with some of them working abroad including the US, Papua New Guinea, Australia, Singapore, and the Middle East. They came to pay tribute to the founder of SM Foundation and to pledge to “pay forward” the generosity of the Sys to other less-fortunate, but bright students who started out like them.

Harley Sy asked the alumni not to oblige their peers, especially the fresh graduates, who are just in the process of etching their names and fortunes.

“It’s not bad to be selfish for now because you have to earn for yourself first. But once you start having more than what you need, then look at others around you and help them so in the future, they can also help others,” Harley said. “More than raising funds, what is important for the alumni is to undertake a mentoring program for current scholars, many of whom get discouraged because of academic failures or personal hardships that make it difficult to maintain their grades,” he said.

“You all know this. You have gone through

these tough times yourselves so help the current scholars in whatever means you can—tutor them where they are weak and make them feel that they are not alone. SM Foundation is, after all, also your home,” Harley said.

Many of those who attended the homecoming only learned about the reunion from social media, so expectedly the batches that came in big numbers were graduates from 2013 upward. Many of those in the early batches of the 25-year-old scholarship program may have failed to make it because they could not be tracked down by the foundation. Because of this predicament, SM Investment Corp. (SMIC) designed a survey for the alumni to complete either online or in printed form to update the scholars’ database and bring in more alumni to join future homecomings.

At present, SM Foundation maintains over 1,000 scholars a year with 2,000 more taking tech-voc courses. So far, 4,000 scholars have graduated from the SM Foundation college education program from partner schools. The program started in 2002.

FEU partners with Indonesian embassy for intl linkages program

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AR Eastern University (FEU), one of the premier educational institutions of the Philippines, announced its partnership with the Indonesian embassy. The collaboration is meant to create an appreciation for the latter’s language and culture.

FEU’s Linkage and Mobility Office (LMO) hosted three home internationalization projects with the embassy, including the Bahasa Language Program, the Batik Workshop and the Wayang (puppet) Making

Workshop: The Bahasa Language Program is a 30-hour certificate class facilitated by an Indonesian language teacher. The first batch was composed of 11 students who completed the class in April 2018.

The current batch consists of 13 Institute of Education students.

The Batik Workshop is a one-day class attended by 10 Institute of Architecture and Fine Arts students.

In the program, attendees learned the popular Javanese art form that dyes clothing and other garments.

Muntinlupa denies claim on state scholars’ dismissal due to political preference

By Roderick L. Abad

A

Contributor

@rodrik_28

MID a viral social-media post of a video claiming the removal of scholars due to their political preference, the Muntinlupa Scholarship Program (MSP) has released an official statement to dispel such erroneous information.

In its Facebook page, MSP said there’s no truth to the video making rounds on the Web. It also assured local scholars of the city government’s impartiality in the implementation of its programs and delivery of public service.

MSP cautioned the beneficiarystudents to be vigilant and wary against fake news which try to misinform and mislead the public. The City of Muntinlupa holds the distinction of having the most number of scholarship-program beneficiaries in the country with over 60,000 scholars. It offers a comprehensive educational assistance program for students from elementary to college level.

Scholarships are also granted to students of technical-vocational

institutions and graduate schools, as well as those taking up law and medicine.

Established in 1990, the scholarship program in Muntinlupa initially catered to college students in local universities, including the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Muntinlupa, then called Muntinlupa Polytechnic College.

Under the leadership of Mayor Jaime Fresnedi, the local government in 2013 expanded to an inclusive-scholarship bracketing as educational assistance was given to elementary and high-school students. In his recent message, the local chief executive underscored his commitment to uphold fairness and objectivity in governance.

“The local government will continue to place public service above politics. We are committed to be unbiased in the delivery of service for all Muntinlupeños, with no one left behind,” he said.

Fresnedi urged local officials to observe solidarity despite approaching the midyear elections so as not to hamper or delay services for their constituents.

Last, the Wayang Making Workshop is a one-day workshop that taught the participants how to make puppets out of buffalo skin. They are mainly used for Wayang kulit, a traditional puppet theater enjoyed in Java, Bali and Lombok. The workshop was attended by 11 student leaders of the English Language Circle and Literature Society, and supervised by two Indonesian teachers.

FEU’s partnership with the Indonesian embassy is part of the university’s international linkages

program, which aims to pursue academic excellence by learning from people and professionals around the globe, as well as commit to building relationships that will create resilient communities.

To date, there are 10 active and comprehensive international partnerships with institutions in Korea, Malaysia and Singapore. The LMO is currently working on securing more partnerships with more Asean neighbors and schools in the US and in Europe.

SNAP Group delights 1,600 school kids last Christmas

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ENEWABLE-ENERGY provider SN Aboitiz Power Group (SNAP Group) topped off 2018 by sharing gifts to nearly 1,600 elementary schoolchildren and 55 school officials from its host communities in Benguet, Ifugao and Isabela.

The gift-giving activity is annually held for the host communities of the hydroelectric power plants owned and managed by the SNAP Group. This is one of the company’s ways of giving back to the community—both as a holiday tradition and as part of its corporate citizenship projects.

SNAP Group’s President and CEO Joseph Yu, together with other executives and volunteers, led the activities held at Ambatali Elementary School in Ramon, Isabela, last December 3 where 446 kids and 17 school officials were gifted with lunch boxes.

In his message, Yu warmly welcomed Ambatali to the SNAP family as the municipality is one of the company’s new host communities.

Ambatali is a major stakeholder of SNAP’s Maris Main Canal Hydro-

electric Power plant inaugurated in January 2018. Maris hydro is the first power plant constructed by SNAP Group since it acquired Magat hydro in 2007 through privatization.

Similar lunch boxes were distributed last December 4 to 995 students and 30 school officials from General Aguinaldo Elementary School in Ramon, Isabela, and Santo Domingo Elementary School in Alfonso Lista, Ifugao—hosts of Magat hydro.

Meanwhile, Yu also led the giftgiving activities in Binga Elementary School in Itogon, Benguet, where 137 kids and eight teachers also received lunch boxes last December 5.

SNAP Group is a joint venture between SN Power of Norway and AboitizPower. It supplies clean, renewable and dependable energy through the operation of the 360to 380-MW Magat Hydroelectric Power Plant on the border of Isabela and Ifugao, the 8.5-megawatt Maris Main Canal HEPP as well as the 105-MW Ambuklao HEPP and the 140-MW Binga HEPP in the province of Benguet.

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Marketing BusinessMirror

Editor: Efleda P. Campos • Monday, January 14, 2019 E3

Being in step with the world’s overwhelming changes T

By Bong R. Osorio

1. Consumers are buying from apps.

E-COMMERCE has traditionally been focused around destination sites like Amazon that are purely focused on shopping.

The world may soon follow the example of China, where consumers are getting what they need and want from apps like WeChat—services where people go to send messages, catch up with friends and follow brands. Today, over 200 million people in China have input their payment details into WeChat. Users scroll rather than search, looking for inspiration within a category rather than for specific items.

This trend is most relevant for fashion and technology, especially low-cost impulse purchases that includes rapid delivery. Shopping becomes more social, easier for consumers to share notifications of a purchase and even buy as a group. It’s easier to attach products to moments, targeting based on cultural events, and the best influencers will become sellers.

2. E-commerce is becoming experiential.

FEATURES like augmented reality and image recognition are allowing merchants to become more playful and introduce experiences to shopping, especially on mobile. Shopping technology company Shopify lets retailers make videos for customers to explore in AR (augmented reality) in their own homes. One example of this is the American bicycle company Pure Cycles. It is also being used to bring experiences to car showrooms, for example, by General Motors.

Snapchat has started to allow commerce through its AR filters. Domino’s Pizza was the first to use this, with an AR pizza box that linked through to an ordering page. Domino’s has now built AR into its own app. It has also entered into a partnership with Amazon, where users can shop for anything they can take a photo of, using image recognition.

Smart speakers like Amazon’s Echo are also making shopping more of an experience, and they are now trying to get more brands onto the platform.

This trend allows brands to let customers try before they buy. It’s most relevant for products that customers are less familiar with, and products that can be personalized or configured. It works well for expensive items, and if done well, it helps less technically savvy people shop with more confidence.

3. Entertainment as conversation.

SNAPCHAT’S Snappables are games played within the app using the camera and lenses. Dunkin’ Donuts is one brand that has advertised in these games. Snapchat is rumored to be increasing its focus on gaming, possibly driven by its partowner, Tencent. Facebook has created multiplayer games for its Messenger video chat, including “Don’t Blink,” which challenges people to keep a straight face. These are designed to liven up chats, but are not ad supported (yet). The inclusion of gaming in messaging makes it much stronger as a channel, commanding more of people’s time. As a medium, it is most relevant to brands with playful personas. Advertising is less intrusive as part of a game than as an interruptive message within a chat.

4. A service to subscribe to, as well as a product to buy.

NETFLIX and Spotify typify this model to encourage customers to see or listen to them. There is a distinction between the purely digital services and the physical brands creating a virtual service, but both types are trying to introduce more touch

need to assess the value of context compared to the value of audiences.

The New York Times, ESPN, and USA Today have created a way of analyzing a page’s content based on the emotion that a page is likely to trigger. They can then place ads or a publicity material that will work best when people are feeling those emotions.

9. Faster connectivity is turning the world to video.

FREEPIK.COM

PR Matters

HE publics are changing. The programs are evolving. The platforms are transforming. It’s time that you, as a marketing and public relations communications custodian, start to reinvent yourself. As singer-songwriter Bob Dylan muses early on: “Come gather around, people, wherever you roam. And admit that the waters around you have grown. Then you’d better start swimming or you’ll sink like a stone. For the times, they’re a-changing” In today’s world, you can consume content everywhere, and you can shop anywhere. These changes are driven by the speed of connection to your devices, the speed of handling and using available data, and the merging of various activities like entertainment, information, communication and play. Carat, a leading media and communications company in the world, shares these 10 trends for 2019 that apprises marketers, communicators, advertising and PR professionals, and business leaders about the latest developments and their implications.

points and create a stronger relationship with the buyer. Over the past six months, you have seen this model extend into previously unexpected categories. Nespresso has introduced a similar model for its coffee machines and pods. By paying a minimal amount for the machine and committing to membership and a subscription for coffee pods, customers are moving from buying a machine to buying a lifestyle. Uber and Lyft are both testing or introducing subscription models in the US, encouraging people to pay a monthly amount for many short rides, or even to protect them from paying surge pricing.

5. “By invitation,” forums and secret accounts.

BRANDS are encouraging their biggest fans to become even more involved by inviting them to have a deeper connection through their own apps, or private social-media communities. Nike’s House of Innovation store in New York allows Nike+ members to call up and reserve stock, to be collected from special lockers. Joining Nike+ is free, but it separates the people who use their Nikes for fitness rather than for everyday wear.

Other brands are experimenting with private forums and “secret” Instagram accounts to give their keenest consumers a chance to get more.

The creation of a self-selecting “by invitation” community is most relevant to brands that are desirable, niche, cult or used by early adopters. It is particularly appropriate for luxury brands, which can create a sense of scarcity and privilege. It is one way to turn fans into a channel and for them to become influencers and advocates for the brand. Once brands have found a small group of passionate fans, it is easier to offer benefits like personalization for them than for a larger group.

6. Out of home (OOH) communication is being revolutionized by digital screens.

IT has become smarter. In 2018 digital accounted for more than 50 percent of OOH ad spend in the UK for the first time; globally, it is projected to be just under 40 percent. Digital’s biggest advantage is being able to change the communication content rapidly, taking cues from the weather and other live data.

Digital OOH starts to have more synergy with other media, particularly mobile.

The new capabilities in OOH will be a big opportunity for clients with a large portfolio of brands, but also for small niche brands that will be able to use OOH tactically for the first time.

7. Data is not just being used to optimize the communication campaign, but also to create the product.

NEW products and services are being created and modified because of data being processed and analyzed at scale. Amazon’s 4-Star Store in New York features products curated from a list of items that have gotten four-star reviews on Amazon, guaranteeing that they are popular and of high quality. The rock band Metallica uses Spotify data to modify set lists when it tours. The band can see which songs are the most popular in each city, and make sure that they include them when they play. Metallica is using this data with Spotify’s full permission.

Choosy, an American-Chinese fast fashion start-up, mines Instagram trends to take inspiration for its designs. By seeing which celebrity looks are the most popular (and getting the most comments like “Where can I buy this?”) they can quickly create highly sought-after pieces. Choosy is using this data without Instagram’s

permission, but only using data that is in the public domain.

8. General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has brought new challenges in how communicators use data to target customers.

IT has driven new ways of thinking.

Media owners and communication technology companies, for example, are putting more focus on the context of the page on which an ad or a press release appears. Others are innovating around the content of the communication, making them more relevant to the moments in which they are seen or read. Communicators

PEOPLE are becoming used to fast connectivity. 4G, only introduced in 2010, now accounts for more than 50 percent of connections in developed markets. More than 400 million Instagram users watch or create stories each day. A percentage of these are video, and video is also being incorporated into messaging apps, including group calling. The hot new app of 2018 is TikTok, a video-sharing app from China. Facebook has now developed its own version, called Lasso.

5G will be many times faster than 4G, and is coming soon. Many cities are trying it now before its launch in 2020. 5G connectivity will give people the ability to stream high-quality video, virtual-reality experiences and more without any latency or buffering. It will also increase the amount of meaningful data being collected from sensors in wearable devices, cars and around cities.

10. Digital detox. Technology is becoming overwhelming, with content and commerce everywhere.

PEOPLE are trying to cut down on their screen time, especially their social-media use, over concerns about

health and well-being. Global Web Index found that 19 percent of those surveyed in the UK and US had been on a digital detox, and 70 percent had tried to cut down on screen time. Concert halls, restaurants and bars are experimenting with banning phones to encourage people to enjoy the moment, not live life through their screens.

Facebook, Instagram and YouTube are introducing tools to let people be more aware of the time they spend with the services. These tools allow you to see time spent, and set alerts to remind you to put your phone down.

Brands need to help their customers have more meaningful connections with their peers. This is especially relevant to brands with an interest in well-being, like fast-moving consumer goods and even socializing, like alcohol companies. “Detoxing” will increasingly be a creative route: “See real life, not a filter.”

PR Matters is a roundtable column by members of the local chapter of the United Kingdom-based International Public Relations Association (Ipra), the world’s premier organization for PR professionals around the world. Bong R. Osorio is a communications consultant of ABS-CBN Corp., SkyCable, DentsuAegis Network and government projects among others, after retiring as vice president and head of the Corporate Communications Division of ABS-CBN. We are devoting a special column each month to answer our readers’ questions about public relations. Please send your questions or comments to askipraphil@gmail.com.

E4

Perspective BusinessMirror

Monday, January 14, 2019

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DLSMHSI’S TOPNOTCHER DOCTORS:

GIVING THEIR HEART OUT FOR SERVICE

By Leony R. Garcia

According to medical doctors, in order for one to become competent, he needs to go beyond the basic lecture material and satisfy his or her curiosity about what he has been taught. As a medic, this extra detail could one day be put into practice in a clinical situation and could make a crucial difference to a patient.

That’s why when one is studying medicine, he’s not just studying for the next exam but taking the first steps on a course of lifelong learning, building his basis of professional knowledge throughout his medical career.

New doctors–Kurl E. Jamora, Zoe Caitlin Z. Fernandez and Lloyd

PHOTOS BY: NONOY LACZA

M

EDICINE is a tough course.

No doubt about it. That’s why being a medical student involves working harder than one has ever worked in his or her life in various areas of study including anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, pharmacology, and pathology, among many others.

Christopher S. Lim – topnotchers all from De La Salle Medical and Health Sciences Institute (DLSMHSI) have adhered to this: to study hard right from the start of medical school and not just for the board exam.

Moreover, they have all aimed to ace the board exams since day one.

“The preparation actually took place when we were still in med school. We studied hard, we took our exams seriously. We joined Transcend, an organization which chooses students to qualify to join local and international competi-

THE topnotchers with their Dean, Dr. Madeleine Grace Sosa

THE Lasallian achievers: (L-R) Dr. Kurt Jamora, Dr. Zoe Caitlin Fernandez and Dr. Lloyd Christopher Lim

tions. Every now and then our group would be holding this session. So I guess that fueled our knowledge and passion for learning even when we were in med school.

That early, that was a big help for reviewing for the board exam,” Dr. Kurt revealed.

“The preparation should really be at the start—at med school— because it would be hard to catch up if you decide (to study and review) the last minute. Since I really aspired to be on top, the effort had to come every day. I had to find the best study practices that worked for me such as watching videos or making my own drawings and a mix or repetition of everything.

That’s how I studied and reviewed on my own. It entailed a lot of reading and studying,” Dr. Zoe agreed.

Dr. Lloyd, who preferred studying alone, also agreed. “Ever since, as a child, I wanted to become a doctor. The opportunity came in the form of scholarships. Being on top is my way of paying back. It has become my earliest motivation—I have always wanted to give back to the school and my benefactor, Br. Gus, for the different grants (which allowed me to study and graduate). So while still at med school, I worked hard to prove that I really deserve the scholarship.

In recent years, DLSMHSI has consistently produced topnotchers in medicine and health-related courses.

The young doctors confessed to somehow been pressured by this.

“Well the moment you become an achiever, there really are high expectations. People expect you to continue your fate until the board exam. So from the start, the pressure has always been there. It’s just a matter of how we handle pressure and convert it into something more productive and tangible. So this is it! We are proud and happy of our achievement so far,” Lloyd beamed with pride.

“There really was a bit of pressure on the school achievers but I was confident that one of us (240 passers) could make it to the top 10,” Zoe added.

The topnotchers of the 2018 Physician Licensure Examination given in September—Kurl, 1st place; Lloyd, 5th place; and Zoe, 9th place – knew that passing the exam is just the beginning of a new colorful journey as medical doctors.

Kurl is currently wrapping up his internship with the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) where he is also applying to specialize in radiation oncology. He said: “We miss lunch, other events, and con-

cerns because we have to attend to our job. But this is the job that we chose. It’s a noble profession because we get to change lives every day. Choosing this path entails that, we already from the beginning, chose other people over ourselves and that’s something that we should live with for the rest of our lives.”

Meanwhile, Zoe who also did her internship at PGH, is now contemplating to accept a job offer as a general practitioner (GP) as she still has to figure out her field of specialization.

“My main inspiration in becoming a doctor are the doctors whom I met in the hospital, my higher-ups.

Watching them, I realize I wanted to be more like them. But for now, after the board exam, all I want to do is to relax first, maybe to have a good dive,” she said.

Lloyd, on the other hand, is set to continue his service at DLSMHSI where he is currently undergoing pre-residency in internal medicine.

Once done, he said he’ll go for cardiology or endocrinology.

“Being a physician is not all about prestige, not all about wearing white or stethoscope. It’s all about sacrificing yourself for others and having real compassion for them especially the indigent patients. So I guess if you don’t have that puso para

sa mga nangangailangan, you won’t be able to change much, to achieve what you want for the patient. I think yung mga kababayan natin they deserve more from us, doctors, and from the government,” he said.

For all these little successes at the moment, the young doctors have realized they have greater responsibilities to do. And they all agreed to bring with them the Lasallian values that have rubbed on them: faith, zeal for service, and community.

The young doctors lament the fact that many patients have to overstay for days because they are not able to pay their bills.

“It will break your heart to see them, being well and recovering but because they have to stay, they contract other ailments, hospital-acquired diseases. So I think maraming dapat baguhin most especially in the government health system. People in rural areas don’t have access to physicians even for basic health care.

Around 4 out of 10 patients don’t see a doctor until they die. That’s one of the most important in the field that we have to pursue, we have to really achieve. Primary health care has been in the system many years now, 40 years, but there’s little progress,” Lloyd observed.

“Many patients immediately go to the specialists when in fact they can be treated by general practitioners so they may not accrue expenses. We need more primary care physicians to screen diseases before going to specialists. And that would save a lot of resources and time,” Kurl agreed.

“In PGH for the internship, I realized there is a big difference between private and public practice in the country. The best thing doctors could do is think about how they can change the system, how they can better serve patients who are really in need,” Zoe said.

Already, our doctors have set their plan for medical practice.

“I decided to become a doctor when I got exposed to the clinical aspect during early internship. That was the time we got exposed to real patients. That’s when I realized I wanted to become one. I see how doctors manage patients and how patients are grateful for making a change in their lives. So being a doctor you get to do that every day not only to one person but to a lot of people you’re helping every day so that’s very fulfilling. After specialization, I intend to practice back in my province, Bacolod,” Kurl said.

Likewise, Zoe doesn’t mind going to the barrio to serve: “That’s the best thing I did for the internship, going out from private to the public setting. That really exposed me to more patients, more people. You got to see what the system is really like.

“So for future docs get out of your comfort zones. To pass the board, study everything. Work hard for it,” she said.

For Lloyd, future doctors should study as early as now and aim to top the board: “Set your heart for it. There’s no room for half-baked. Strive for it. Whatever happens, keep your eyes on the prize. When that happens don’t forget to thank God and all the people who allowed or who gave you the opportunity to do so.

“Without my scholarship, along with my co-grantees, I won’t be here right now. I intend to come back and practice here in the future. DLSMHSI has not only taught me medical knowledge and skill but also values.

De La Salle had made it a point to raise doctors that are not only intelligent and skilled but are also compassionate and with zeal for service,” Lloyd concluded.